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EDITORIAL  ECHOES 


EDITORIAL  ECHOES 


BY 

WILLIAM  MORTON  i  PAYNE 


CHICAGO 

A.  C.  McCLURG  &  CO. 
1902 


Copyright 

A.  C.  McClurg  &  Co. 

1902  * 

Published  March,  1902 


Composition   by  The   Dial   Press,    Chicago,    U.  S.  A. 
Presswork  by  The  University  Press,  Cambridge,  U.  S.  A. 


TO 

EDMUND    CLARENCE   STEDMAN 

POET  AND  CRITIC 

WITH  THE  LOVE  AND  GRATITUDE 

OF  THE  AUTHOR 


PREFACE. 

This  book,  like  the  *  Little  Leaders '  to  which  it  is  a 
companion,  is  made  up  of  leading  articles  written  for 
*  The  Dial '  during  recent  years.  The  retention  of  the 
plural  pronoun  seemed  advisable,  because  its  elimination 
would  have  involved  structural  alterations  that  it  seemed 
better  not  to  make.  The  only  changes  that  a  comparison 
with  the  originals  would  discover  are  those  required  by  • 
the  interval  between  the  first  publication  of  these  unpre- 
tending papers  and  their  present  reissue.  It  is  the  hope 
of  the  writer  that,  even  within  their  narrow  limits,  they 
may  be  found  to  have  given  expression  to  certain  of  the 
more  vital  aspects  of  the  great  subjects  with  which  they 
are  concerned. 

Chicago,  March  i,  1902. 


!vi884974 


CONTENTS. 

LITERATURE   AND   CRITICISM. 

Sonnet  —  Dante, 

PAGE 

Dante  in  America 13 

French  Poetry  and  English 22 

World  Literature 33 

Twenty  Years  of  European  Literature  .  .  42 
The  Great  Books  of  the  Nineteenth  Century  6j 
The  Victorian  Garden  of  Song  ....  76 
The  Creative  Period  of  American  Verse  .  85 
The  Formula  of  American  Literature  .  .  95 
A  Century  of  American  Fiction  ....  104 
The  Poetry  of  Mr.   Moody 113 

EDUCATION. 

The  Teacher  as  an  Individual 135 

The  Commencement  Season ,  144 

Boys  and  Girls  and  Books 153 

A  Memory  Forever 161 

Science  in  Seconda-ry  Schools 170 

The  World's  Memory 177 

Scholarship  and  Culture 185 


X.  CONTENTS— Continued. 

PAGE 

Two  Centennials 194 

Concerning  Degrees 203 

The  Future  of  English  Spelling    ....   212 

IN    MEMORIAM. 

John  Ruskin 223 

William  Ewart  Gladstone 234 

Frederick  Max  Muller 244 

William  Morris  . 253 

William  Black 262 

John  Fiske 269 

Harold  Frederic 277 

Richard  Malcolm  Johnston         285 

Alphonse  Daudet 2193 

Victor  Cherbuliez 302 


DANTE. 

Poet  !  who  in  thy  vision  journeyedst  through 
Hell's  deep,  and  up  the  purifying  hill, 
Through  fires  both  temporal  and  eternal,  till 

The  rose  of  God's  elect  entranced  thy  view,  — 

To  thee  had  life  revealed  as  to  but  few 
Among  the  sons  of  men,  what  terrors  fill 
The  world's  wild  thicket,  what   the  joyous 
thrill 

That  knows  alone  the  steadfast  soul  and  true. 

This  great  New  World  lay  far  beyond  thy  ken 
When  thou  didst  conquer  life,  and  win  release 

From  all  its  heavy  load ;  yet  now  as  then. 
And  here  as  there,  thy  words  may  never  cease 

To  breathe  into  the  inmost  souls  of  men 

Thy    strength,    thy    tenderness,    thy    perfect 
peace. 


DANTE   IN   AMERICA. 

Herr  Scartazzini,  the  industrious  German- 
Italian  conrimentator  upon  Dante,  has  spoken  of 
America  as  'the  new  Ravenna  of  the  great 
poet.'  The  comparison  is  a  little  forced,  for  the 
spiritual  abiding  place  of  the  deepest  and  tender- 
est  of  singers  is  now  the  whole  civilized  world, 
rather  than  any  circumscribed  area  thereof;  but , 
our  own  country  may  at  least  claim  a  considerable 
share  in  his  heritage,  and  no  modern  students 
have  done  him  greater  honor  or  paid  him  more 
true  allegiance  than  our  Longfellow,  Lowell,  and 
Parsons,  among  the  dead,  and  our  Charles  Eliot 
Norton,  among  the  living.  These  names  occur 
to  everyone  who  gives  a  moment's  thought  to  the 
history  of  Dante  studies  in  America,  but  there 
are  few  who  realize  how  many  other  nineteenth- 
century  Americans  have  from  time  to  time  paid 
the  sincere  tribute  of  their  praise  to  the  poet  who, 
beyond  any  other  that  ever  lived,  binds  with 
'  hoops  of  steel '  the  souls  of  his  followers  to  his 


14  Editorial  Echoes 

own.  We  are  more  than  ever  before  impressed 
with  this  fact  after  reading  Mr.  Theodore  W. 
Koch's  excellent  study  of  '  Dante  in  America/ 
published  as  the  chief  feature  of  the  Fifteenth 
Annual  Report  of  the  Dante  Society,  and  also 
issued  by  the  author  as  an  independent  volume. 
The  work  is  the  outcome  of  a  suggestion  made 
by  Professor  Norton,  who,  as  early  as  1865, 
when  the  sixth  centenary  of  Dante's  birth  was 
celebrated,  sent  to  the  authorities  at  Florence  a 
list  of  the  more  important  American  contributions 
that  had  then  been  made  to  the  literature  of  the 
subject. 

The  first  chapters  of  Mr.  Koch's  monograph 
are  devoted  to  the  work  of  the  pioneers,  among 
whom  Lorenzo  da  Ponte,  George  Ticknor,  and 
Richard  Henry  Wilde  are  the  most  noteworthy. 
The  first  of  these  three  was  a  Venetian,  who, 
after  a  picturesquely  varied  career  in  several 
lands,  came  to  America  at  the  age  of  fifty-six. 
It  is  interesting  to  note  that  he  was  the  librettist 
of  Mozart's  '  Don  Giovanni '  and  '  Le  Nozze  di 
Figaro,'  and  that  when  he  began  the  book  of  the 
former  opera,  '  he  started  by  reading  a  few  lines 
from  Dante's  "  Inferno,"  in  order,  as  he  says,  to 


Literature  and  Criticism         15 

put  himself  into  good  tune.'  He  lived  in  Amer- 
ica about  thirty  years,  and  died  in  New  York  in 
1838.  His  occupation  in  New  York  was  that 
of  a  bookseller.  He  also  taught  his  native  lan- 
guage, and  was  an  unsalaried  tutor  at  Columbia 
College  for  a  term  of  years.  There  is  evidence 
that  he  lectured  and  wrote  a  great  deal  upon  the 
subject  of  Dante,  and  his  contributions  to  the 
short-lived  '  New  York  Review  and  Athenaeum 
Magazme '  constitute  the  first  American  textual 
criticism  of  '  The  Divine  Comedy.'  Not  very 
much  is  known  of  his  life,  and  his  closing  years 
are  wrapped  in  obscurity.  In  the  pathetic  preface 
of  one  of  his  later  publications,  he  says  :  '  During 
twenty-eight  years  I  have  instructed  in  my  lan- 
guage, which  /,  and  no  other^  introduced  into 
America,  two  thousand  five  hundred  people,  of 
whom  two  thousand  four  hundred  and  ninety- 
four  have  forgotten  me.' 

At  the  time  when  Da  Ponte  was  engaged  in 
awakening  our  interest  in  Dante,  a  scholar  of 
American  birth  was  at  work  at  the  same  task. 
What  we  may  call  the  Harvard  tradition  con- 
cerning Dante  began  with  George  Ticknor,  who 
had  learned  in  Germany  to  know  the  poet,  and 


i6  Editorial  Echoes 

who,  in  1 83 1,  was  lecturing  upon  him  three  times 
a  week  at  Harvard.  Ticknor's  second  sojourn 
in  Europe  made  him  acquainted  with  '  Phila- 
lethes,'  otherwise  Prince  John  of  Saxony,  who 
was  then  at  work  upon  his  well-known  transla- 
tion, and  a  number  of  evenings  were  spent  at  the 
Prince's  residence.  The  meetings  of  this  '  Acca- 
demia  Dantesca '  were  devoted  to  discussion  of 
the  translation  then  in  hand,  Tieck  being  one  of 
the  participants.  They  were  of  much  -help  to 
Ticknor,  and  the  notes  made  by  him  at  this  time 
served  as  the  basis  of  his  subsequent  class-room 
work  at  Cambridge.  The  historian  Prescott  was 
also  interested  in  Dante  about  this  time,  and  a 
letter  written  to  Ticknor,  and  dated  1824,  is 
interesting  as  '  one  of  the  earliest  American  esti- 
mates of  the  great  Florentine,'  as  well  as  for  the 
critical  insight  which  it  displays.  Prescott  was 
never  a  close  student  of  Dante,  but  his  reading 
went  far  enough  to  show  him  the  many  ways  in 
which  the  second  and  third  cantiche  are  superior 
to  the  first,  which  some  later  and  closer  students 
have  failed  to  perceive. 

Richard  Henry  Wilde,  of  Georgia,  an  Irish- 
man by  birth,  but  an  American  by  adoption,  is 


Literature  and  Criticism         17 

not  very  well  known  among  Dante  scholars  for 
the  reason  that  little  of  his  work  was  ever  pub- 
lished. He  spent,  however,  several  years  in 
Italy,  and  devoted  himself  largely  to  the  study 
of  Italian  poetry.  His  '  Life  and  Times  of 
Dante,'  which  he  left  uncompleted,  exists  only 
in  manuscript,  and  the  last  of  the  written  sheets 
bears  the  date  of  1842.  During  his  stay  in 
Florence,  he  made  extensive  original  researches, 
and  established  several  points  that  had  escaped 
his  predecessors.  '  I  examined  everything  be- 
longing to  my  era  in  the  archives,  line  by  line,' 
are  the  words  in  which  he  describes  his  Dantean 
labors.  The  fact  of  chief  interest  in  this  con- 
nection is  that  he  was  one  of  the  three  men  to 
whom  we  owe  the  discovery  of  the  Giotto  por- 
trait in  the  Bargello.  The  credit  for  this  dis- 
covery belongs  to  Wilde,  Kirkup,  and  Bezzi. 
The  search  was  set  on  foot  by  Wilde,  and  car- 
ried on  with  the  aid  of  the  Englishman  and  the 
Italian,  the  former  of  whom  afterwards  '  took  to 
himself  credit  for  everything.'  Irving's  account 
of  the  matter  is  perhaps  as  fair  as  any,  giving 
Wilde  his  due,  and  closing  as  follows:  '  It  is  not 

easy  to  appreciate  the  delight  of  Mr.  Wilde  and 
2 


1 8  Editorial  Echoes 

his  coadjutors  at  this  triumphant  result  of  their 
researches ;  nor  the  sensation  produced,  not 
merely  in  Florence  but  throughout  Italy,  by  this 
discovery  of  a  veritable  portrait  of  Dante  in  the 
prime  of  his  days.  It  was  some  such  sensation 
as  would  be  produced  in  England  by  the  sudden 
discovery  of  a  perfectly  vi^ell-authenticated  likeness 
of  Shakespeare,  v^ith  a  difference  in  intensity 
proportioned  to  the  superior  sensitiveness  of  the 
Italians.'  Simms  was  another  American  writer 
who  wrote  appreciatively  of  Wilde's  work  for 
Dante,  and  it  may  be  mentioned  that  Simms 
himself  knew  the  poet  and  translated  a  fragment 
of  the  '  Inferno '  into  English  triple  rhyme. 

Upon  the  Dantean  labors  of  Longfellow, 
Lowell,  Parsons,  and  Professor  Norton  it  is  hardly 
necessary  to  dilate,  so  familiar  are  they  to  our 
readers.  Two  of  these  men  have  given  us  com- 
plete translations  of  '  The  Divine  Comedy  '  — 
the  one  in  verse,  the  other  in  prose  —  while  a 
third  has  given  us  a  verse  translation  of  about 
two-thirds  of  the  work.  Professor  Norton  has 
given  us,  in  addition,  a  translation  of  'The  New 
Life.'  Lowell,  who  may  not  be  reckoned  among 
the  translators,  has  enriched  our  literature  with 


Literature  and  Criticism         19 

an  essay  on  Dante  which,  in  the  words  of  a 
friend,  '  makes  other  writing  about  the  poet  and 
the  poem  seem  ineffectual  and  superfluous.'  The 
sixth  centenary  of  the  poet's  birth  was  signalized 
in  America  by  Professor  Norton's  monograph 
*•  On  the  Original  Portraits  of  Dante,'  and  by  the 
private  issue  of  parts  of  the  translations  made  by 
Longfellow  and  Parsons.  Longfellow  began  to 
lecture  upon  Dante  in  1836  at  Harvard  College, 
and  continued  this  class-room  work  for  some 
twenty  years.  His  completed  translation  was 
published  in  1867,  with  the  notes  and  illustrations 
that  have  helped  so  many  students  during  the 
past  thirty  years,  to  say  nothing  of  the  six  noble 
sonnets  that  are  known  to  all  lovers  of  poetry. 
As  early  as  1843,  Persons  gave  to  the  public  ten 
cantos  of  his  translation,  and  prefaced  them  by 
the  memorable  '  Lines  on  a  Bust  of  Dante.'  He 
worked  upon  his  translation  at  intervals  for  nearly 
half  a  century  more,  but  died  with  the  second 
canticle  unfinished,  and  the  third  hardly  attempted. 
The  class-room  work  at  Harvard,  begun  by 
Ticknor  and  carried  on  for  so  many  years  by 
Longfellow,  was  continued  with  even  more  of 
inspirational  effect  by  Lowell,  and  has  of  recent 


20  Editorial  Echoes 

years  been  conducted  by  Professor  Norton  in  a 
spirit  worthy  of  the  tradition  handed  down  to  him. 
The  Dante  Society,  founded  in  1881  by  Professor 
Norton  and  others,  is  said  to  be  the  oldest  or- 
ganization of  its  kind  in  existence.  Finally,  it 
must  be  added  that  the  American  student  of 
Dante  may  now  have  access  to  collections  of 
material  that  are  hardly  to  be  equalled  in  any 
other  country.  The  Harvard  collection  has  been 
enriched  by  accretions  from  many  sources,  while 
the  generosity  of  Professor  Willard  Fiske  has 
provided  Cornell  University  with  '  what  is  in 
some  respects  the  most  remarkable  Dante  col- 
lection in  the  world.' 

These  are  the  facts  of  major  importance  con- 
cerning the  history  of  Dante  studies  in  America. 
For  the  minor  facts,  we  must  refer  to  Mr.  Koch's 
admirable  bibliography,  which  fills  nearly  seventy 
pages,  and  which  includes  not  only  editions  and 
commentaries,  but  poems,  magazine  articles,  and 
notes  on  the  more  important  critical  reviews  of 
the  works  mentioned.  For  a  first  attempt  at  a 
bibliography  of  this  sort,  the  work  has  been  done 
with  unusual  thoroughness,  and  deserves  high 
commendation.    Year  by  year  the  entries  increase 


Literature  and  Criticism         21 

in  number,  and  testify  to  a  rapidly  growing  in- 
terest in  the  subject.  The  catalogues  of  many 
of  our  leading  universities  now  offer  special 
courses  in  Dante,  and  the  leaven  of  this  study  is 
at  work  in  our  national  life.  It  is  possibly  true, 
as  Mr.  Koch  says,  that  'there  is  no  hope  of 
Dante  ever  taking  the  place  of  a  popular  author 
with  us,  of  becoming  one  of  our  intimates,'  but 
it  is  also  true  that  there  are  other  ways  than  that 
of  direct  contact  for  the  ideals  of  a  great  poet 
and  thinker  to  influence  the  minds  of  the  masses. 
A  better  acquaintance  with  Dante  would  un- 
doubtedly '  leave  us  a  sense  of  the  emptiness  of 
much  of  that  which  we  make  our  boast,  and 
would  teach  us  the  instability  of  national  position 
and  the  permanence  of  moral  worth  alone.' 


22  Editorial  Echoes 


FRENCH  POETRY  AND  ENGLISH. 

The  subject  of  the  comparative  merits  and  capa- 
bilities of  the  French  and  English  languages  as 
media  for  poetical  expression  comes  up  period- 
ically in  the  literary  journals,  and  appears  to  be 
as  far  from  settlement  as  ever.  In  its  modern 
critical  phase,  the  discussion  seems  to  have  found 
its  starting-point  in  that  puzzling  final  chapter 
of  Taine's  '  English  Literature/  which  makes  an 
elaborate  comparison  between  Musset  and  Ten- 
nyson, and  returns  a  verdict  in  favor  of  the 
French  poet.  '  I  prefer  Alfred  de  Musset  to 
Tennyson,'  were  the  words  with  which  Taine 
closed  the  chapter,  and  for  many  years  his  En- 
glish critics  refused  to  take  such  a  dictum  seri- 
ously, setting  it  down  rather  summarily  as  one 
of  those  aberrations  of  judgment  into  which  the 
best  of  men  are  apt  to  be  betrayed  by  the  con- 
ditions of  their  own  milieu  and  moment.  No 
doubt  the  characterization  of  '  In  Memoriam ' 
as  '  cold,   monotonous,   and  often   too   prettily 


Literature  and  Criticism        23 

arranged '  lent  color  to  the  assumption  that  the 
French  critic  was  incapable  of  feeling  what  Ten- 
nyson meant  to  his  English  readers,  and  that  his 
preference  for  Musset  was  nothing  more  than  an 
illustration  of  racial  prejudice.  After  all,  Taine 
was  a  Frenchman,  poor  thing,  and  could  not  be 
expected  to  know  any  better.  These  words  would 
fairly  sum  up  the  undercurrent  of  feeling  that  ran 
beneath  the  various  polite  phrases  with  which 
his  hi%arre  opinion  was  glanced  at  and  dismissed. 
The  subject  being  thus  brought  into  the  forum 
of  discussion,  a  great  many  English  writers  were 
found  to  hold  a  similar  view,  and  it  got  to  be  a 
sort  of  critical  commonplace  to  say  that,  while 
French  prose  was  an  unsurpassable  form  of  ex- 
pression, French  poetry  was  not  to  be  compared 
with  English,  that  the  French  language  was  in- 
capable of  scaling  the  higher  peaks  of  poetical 
sublimity,  or  of  sounding  the  deeper  harmonies 
of  song.  The  weight  of  Matthew  Arnold's 
authority  was  added  to  this  concurrence  of  lesser 
opinion,  and  the  question  seemed  to  be  settled. 
Moreover,  who  but  an  Englishman  could  enter 
into  the  spirit  of  English  poetry,  and  how  pre- 
sumptuous it  was  for   Frenchmen,  one  of  the 


24  Editorial  Echoes 

most  distinguished  of  whom  had  called  Shake- 
speare '  a  drunken  savage/  to  pretend  to  under- 
stand it.  As  for  the  ability  of  an  Englishman  to 
see  all  that  there  was  in  French  poetry,  and  to 
expose  the  hollowness  of  its  pretensions,  that  was 
quite  another  matter.  Matthew  Arnold,  we  are 
told,  was  fond  of  quoting  French  Alexandrines 
followed  by  Shakespearian  verses,  whereupon  he 
would  exclaim  '  What  a  relief! '  Now,  with  all 
due  respect  for  this  great  critic,  such  a  method 
of  comparison  proves  nothing  more  than  the 
possession  of  a  fatuous  national  self-sufficiency 
on  the  part  of  the  writer  who  makes  use  of  it, 
and  the  fact  that  a  French  critic  would  reverse 
the  process,  and  feel  equally  relieved  by  the 
Alexandrine  cadence,  is  all  the  answer  that  such 
an  argument  needs.  The  ideal  method  of  dealing 
with  the  dispute  would  probably  be  its  reference 
to  a  court  of  arbitration  composed,  say,  of  Rus- 
sians and  Hungarians  equally  familiar  with  both 
French  and  English,  if  such  might  be  found. 

In  the  matter  of  mutual  comprehension  and 
appreciation,  both  French  and  English  criticism 
have  advanced,  of  late  years  far  beyond  the  point 
at  which  it  was  possible  for  a  Frenchman  to  ig- 


Literature  and  Criticism         25 

nore  English  literature  altogether,  and  for  an 
Englishman  to  assume  complacently  the  entire 
superiority  of  his  own  poetry  over  that  of  his 
neighbor  across  the  Channel.  There  have  been 
too  many  careful  studies  of  English  literature  by 
French  critics,  and  too  many  interpreters  of  French 
poetry  to  English  readers,  for  either  of  these  pro- 
vincial positions  to  be  maintained,  and  it  is  highly 
significant  that  a  recent  volume  of  essays  by 
Professor  W.  P.  Trent  should  again  take  up  the 
question  of  Tennyson  and  Musset,  this  time  to 
refer  to  it  in  the  following  language  :  ^  To  those 
of  us  who  have  been  allowed  to  see  the  error  of 
our  way  through  our  reading  of  Hugo,  Leconte 
de  Lisle,  and  Musset  himself,  who  have  learned 
to  our  surprise  that  much  of  what  our  teachers 
had  told  us  about  the  insufficiency  of  the  French 
language  to  the  expression  of  high  poetic  thought 
and  sentiment  was  due  to  mere  ignorance  on  their 
part,  a  doubt  has  perhaps  come  more  than  once 
whether  Taine  was  not  partly  justified  in  his 
preference  for  Musset  over  Tennyson.'  This 
passage  is  significant  simply  because  it  abandons 
the  old  arrogant  English  attitude,  and  evinces  a 
disposition  to  reopen  the  question  once  thought 


26  Editorial  Echoes 

to  be  closed,  to  reexamine  it  in  an  enlightened 
spirit  and  with  a  candid  mind.  Mr.  Trent  by- 
no  means  claims  to  reverse  the  former  decision, 
but  he  does  go  so  far  as  to  say  that  ^  it  is  certainly 
permissible  for  those  who  care  for  the  lyrical 
expression  of  intense  passion  to  maintain  that 
they  find  little  or  nothing  in  Tennyson  that  takes 
the  place  for  them  of  Musset's  chief  poems.' 

<  C'est  cette  voix  du  coeur  qui  seule  au  coeiir  arrive. 
Que  nul  autre,  apres  toi,  ne  nous  rendra  jamais.' 

The  whole  general  subject  of  French  and 
English  poetry  was  under  discussion  not  long  ago 
in  the  pages  of  ^  The  Saturday  Review,'  and  it 
is  not  often  that  the  *■  silly  season '  of  English 
journalism  gets  hold  of  so  interesting  a  theme. 
The  discussion  was  started  by  the  irrepressible 
'  Max,'  apropos  of  Mme.  Bernhardt's  '  Hamlet,' 
and  for  once  this  humming-bird  critic  plunged 
his  beak  into  the  very  heart  of  the  blossoms  among 
which  he  was  disporting.  Complaining  that 
'  Paix,  paix,  ame  troublee  !  '  for  example,  was  en- 
tirely inadequate  to  reproduce  the  '  Rest,  rest, 
perturbed  spirit ! '  of  the  original  —  which  is  un- 
doubtedly true —  he  said  : 

<  The  fact  is  that  the  French  language,  h'mpid  and  ex- 


Literature  and  Criticism         27 

quislte  though  it  Is,  affords  no  scope  for  phrases  which, 
like  this  phrase  of  Shakespeare's,  are  charged  with  a  dim 
significance  beyond  their  meaning  and  with  reverbera- 
tions beyond  their  sound.  The  French  language,  like 
the  French  genius,  can  give  no  hint  of  things  beyond 
those  which  it  definitely  expresses.  For  expression,  it  is 
a  far  finer  Instrument  than  our  language 5  but  it  Is  not, 
in  the  sense  that  our  language  is,  suggestive.  It  lacks 
mystery.  It  casts  none  of  those  purple  shadows  which 
do  follow  and  move  with  the  moving  phrases  of  our  great 
poets.' 

With  these  observations  the  train  was  fired  that 
led  to  a  series  of  veritable  explosions  of  opinion 
on  the  part  of  correspondents  of  the  paper,  and 
the  discussion  v^hich  was  thus  evoked  continued 
for  many  weeks. 

First  of  all,  another  '  M.  B.'  rallied  to  the 
defense  of  the  language  thus  attacked,  denied  the 
charges  in  toto^  and  quoted  various  passages  which 
were  certainly  not  lacking,  to  a  properly  attuned 
ear,  in  the  quality  of  mysterious  suggestiveness. 
'  I  maintain,'  said  the  writer,  '  that  Racine's 
lines  — 

**  Ariane,  ma  sceur,  de  quel  amour  blessee, 
Vous  mourutes  aux  bords  ou  vous  futes  laissee!'* 

Are  quite  as  suggestive  as  "  Rest,  rest,  perturbed 


28  Editorial  Echoes 

spirit !  "  '  We,  for  one,  will  not  deny  the  haunt- 
ing quality  of  the  couplet,  which  casts  shadows 
quite  as  purple  as  those  of  the  Shakespearian 
phrase  brought  into  comparison.  This  writer 
closed  his  letter  with  a  felicitous  revival  of  the 
old  '  Punch '  story  about  the  little  girl  and  her 
nurse.  '  And  you  must  know,  Parker,  that  in 
France  they  say  Wee  for  Yes.'  '  La  !  Miss,' 
answered  the  nurse,  '  how  paltry  ! ' 

The  letter  above  described  at  once  excited  the 
combative  instincts  of  Professor  Tyrrell,  who 
rushed  into  the  fray  with  the  argument  that 
French  is  ^  an  essentially  emasculated  tongue,  in 
fact,  pigeon-Latin.'  Had  the  Dublin  professor 
been  content  to  leave  his  argument  unsupported 
by  examples,  all  might  have  been  well,  but  in  an 
unfortunate  moment  he  added :  '  When  a  French- 
man says  a  girl  is  "  beaucoup  belle  "  he  is  using 
Latin  as  a  Chinese  would  be  using  English  if  he 
called  her  "good-whack  good."'  The  week 
following  this  several  further  communications 
appeared,  but  the  main  subject  was  for  the 
moment  forgotten  in  the  opportunity  offered  to 
say  cutting  things  about  Professor  Tyrrell's 
'  beaucoup  belle.'    As  one  writer  remarked,  '  An 


Literature  and  Criticism         29 

Englishman  who  said  this  would  be  treated  to  the 
courtesy  due  to  strangers,  but  a  Frenchman 
would  be  preparing  for  himself  an  unhappy 
manhood  and  a  friendless  old  age.'  After  this 
interlude  the  original  theme  was  again  taken  up, 
and  illuminated,  during  successive  weeks,  by  an 
array  of  views  and  pertinent  quotations  that  were 
unfailing  in  their  interest. 

It  may  be  said  that  such  a  discussion  leads  to 
nothing,  which  is  in  one  sense  true ;  yet  in 
another  sense  we  must  say  that  it  leads  to  a 
greater  catholicity  of  temper  and  openness  of 
mind,  thus  accomplishing  a  highly  useful  purpose. 
But  the  old  misconception  of  French  poetry  as 
incapable  of  sounding  the  depths  of  the  spiritual 
life  is  one  that  dies  hard.  We  have  never  seen, 
on  the  whole,  an  abler  plea  for  this  view  than 
was  contained  in  a  leading  article  once  published 
in  '  Literature.'  ^  There  are  two  great  ways,'  we 
were  told,  '  by  which  men  and  nations  may  guide 
their  thought :  the  way  of  materialism,  and  the 
way  of  mysticism.  Surely  we  may  sum  up  the 
whole  discussion  by  saying  that  the  French  na- 
tion has  chosen  the  former,  and  that  the  French 
language  reflects  the  limitations  of  the  material- 


30  Editorial  Echoes 

istic  position.'     Surely  ?     Let  this  contention  be 
met  by  Victor  Hugo. 
*  Ne  possede-t-il  pas  toute  la  certitude  ? 
Dieu  ne  remplit-il  pas  ce  monde,  notre  etude, 

Du  nadir  au  zenith  ? 
Notre  sagesse  aupres  de  la  slenne  est  demence. 
Et  n'est-ce  pas  a  lui  que  la  clarte  commence, 
Et  que  r  ombre  finit  ? 

'D'ailleurs,  pensons.      Nos  jours  sont  des  jours  d'amer- 
tume, 
Mais,  quand  nous  etendons  les  bras  dans  cette  brume. 

Nous  sentons  une  main; 
Quand    nous    marchons,    courbes,    dans    T  ombre    du 

martyre. 
Nous  entendons  quelqu'un  derriere  nous  nous  dire: 
C'est  ici  le  chemln.' 

Again,  '  French  hterature  must  have  no  strange- 
ness in  the  proportion,  no  vague  epithets  that 
hint  of  worlds  unseen  and  unsuspected  secrets.' 
But  what  of  M.  de  Heredia's  magical  verses 
upon  the  companions  of  Columbus  ? 

'  Chaque  soir,  esperant  des  lendemains  epiques, 
L'azur  phosphorescent  de  la  mer  des  Tropiques 
Enchantait  leur  sommeil  d'un  mirage  dore; 
Ou,  penches  a  Tavant  des  blanches  caravelles, 
lis  regardaient  monter  en  im  ciel  ignore 
Du  fond  de  T Ocean  des  etolles  nouvelles.' 


Literature  and  Criticism        31 

Our  writer  concludes  with  these  eloquent  words: 
^  Our  debate  is  not  of  what  is  true,  but  of  what 
is  beautiful  ;  the  artist  cannot  hesitate  between 
the  sacramental  words  and  the  chemical  formula, 
and  it  must  be  said  again  and  again  that  from  the 
French  ports  no  ship  sails  into  faery  lands  forlorn. 
French  literature  is  the  most  delightful  garden  in 
the  world ;  but  the  neat  hedges  of  that  gay 
parterre  shut  in  the  view,  and  no  man  standing 
by  the  bosky  arbors  can  behold  the  vision  of 
Monsalvat  or  the  awful  towers  of  Carbonek  far 
in  the  spiritual  city.'  The  beauty  of  these  words 
is  obvious,  and  equally  obvious  their  sincerity ; 
yet  thought  of  the  work  of  Hugo  alone  is  suffi- 
cient for  their  refutation.  There  is  no  note  of 
music  that  he  has  not  struck,  no  chord  of  the 
life  of  the  soul  that  has  not  sounded  from  his 
lyre.  The  lyric  rapture  of  '  Le  Chasseur  Noir ' 
and  '  Un  Peu  de  Musique'  is  essentially  one 
with  the  lyric  rapture  of  Shelley,  and  above  this 
height  the  wings  of  song  may  not  be  borne.  The 
superiority  of  English  poetry  over  French  is  in 
its  quantity  rather  than  in  its  quality.  It  may 
fairly  be  admitted  that  Shakespeare  and  Milton 
and  Shelley  and  Tennyson  outweigh  Racine  and 


32  Editorial  Echoes 

Hugo  and  Musset  and  Leconte  de  Lisle,  but 
only  those  who  are  '  tone-deaf '  to  the  music  of 
French  verse  and  untouched  by  the  subtleties  of 
its  emotional  suggestiveness  can  maintain  that  it 
never  soars  to  the  highest  plane  of  imaginative 
beauty  and  spiritual  insight. 


Literature  and  Criticism         33 


WORLD   LITERATURE. 

In  the  happy  mediaeval  days  it  was  easy  to  be  a 
world-writer.  When  Latin  was  the  language  of 
scholarship  everywhere,  and  when  to  be  educated 
meant  more  than  anything  else  the  ability  to  read 
Latin,  whatever  writings  were  worth  heeding 
promptly  made  their  appeal  to  the  whole  edu- 
cated public.  It  was  not  a  very  large  public  in 
point  of  numbers,  but  it  was  a  widely-scattered 
one,  and  it  had  a  thirst  for  ideas  that  puts  us 
moderns  to  shame.  When  the  confusion  of 
tongues  seized  upon  the  European  peoples,  as  a 
regrettable  but  inevitable  incident  in  the  develop- 
ment of  their  several  nationalities,  the  world- 
writer  in  the  old  sense  became  extinct.  Yet  we 
cannot  altogether  regret  that  Dante,  for  example, 
wrote  his  greatest  work  in  the  vulgar  tongue,  or 
that  Petrarch  sought  diversion  from  the  serious 
business  of  the  epic  in  writing  certain  Italian 
sonnets  to  a  young  woman  named  Laura.  Nev- 
ertheless, ^  The  Divine  Comedy  '  and  the  '  Can- 
3 


34  Editorial  Echoes 

zoniere '  could  not  hope  to  find  readers  outside 
of  Italy,  whereas  the  '  De  Monarchia'  and  the 
'  Africa  '  could  command  the  attention  of  all  the 
world.  We  can  easily  understand  why  Petrarch 
looked  slightingly  upon  his  sonnets,  and  why 
Dante  hesitated  a  long  while  before  turning  from 
Latin  to  Italian.  We  can  also  picture  to  our- 
selves the  astonishment  of  these  men,  could  they 
have  foreseen  that  posterity  would  hold  of  slight 
account  all  that  they  wrote  in  the  language  of 
scholars,  and  would  treasure  among  the  most 
precious  of  its  literary  possessions  their  compo- 
sitions couched  in  the  despised  language  of  the 
common  people. 

When  the  languages  of  modern  Europe  came 
to  be  the  recognized  vehicles  of  literary  expres- 
sion, there  could  be  no  more  world-writers  in  the 
mediaeval  sense.  The  Latin  classics,  of  course, 
retained  their  prestige,  and  the  Greek  classics,  so 
eagerly  studied  by  the  men  of  the  Renaissance, 
quickly  took  their  place  beside  the  Latin,  or 
rather  took  the  superior  place  to  which  their 
extraordinary  spontaneity  and  perfection  entitled 
them.  But  the  new  writers  of  the  Renaissance 
centuries  were  nearly  restricted  to  the  public  of 


Literature  and  Criticism        35 

their  respective  peoples.  We  have  seen  how 
Dante  and  Petrarch,  standing  as  it  v^ere  upon 
the  v^^ater-shed  that  divides  ancient  from  modern 
culture,  contributed  with  doubt  and  hesitation  to 
the  streams  that  were  to  flow  down  into  modern 
life  for  its  refreshment  and  quickening.  Boc- 
caccio was  in  similar  case,  although  perceiving 
rather  more  clearly  that  the  vitality  of  Latin  lit- 
erature was  well-nigh  spent.  When  we  come  to 
Ariosto  and  Tasso,  to  Rabelais  and  Montaigne, 
to  Cervantes  and  Lope  de  Vega,  to  Shakespeare 
and  his  starry  train,  we  come  to  an  age  in  which 
the  most  remarkable  manifestations  of  literary 
activity  are  evidently  indigenous  to  their  own 
soil.  There  are  no  longer  any  world-writers, 
unless  we  apply  the  term  to  such  belated  classi- 
cists as  Poliziano  and  Erasmus.  If  we  contrast 
Erasmus,  particularly,  with  any  of  the  great 
writers  just  named,  Shakespeare  and  the  others 
not  only  write  in  the  languages  of  their  own" 
people,  but  each  of  them  embodies  in  his  thought 
the  distinctive  characteristics  and  ideals  of  his 
own  race.  Erasmus,  on  the  other  hand,  is  no 
more  Dutch  than  Italian,  no  more  Italian  than 
German,  and  he  is  almost  as  much  English  as  he 


36  Editorial  Echoes 

is  anything  else.  While  it  is  true  that  the  Eliza- 
bethan English  displayed  a  remarkable  zeal  in 
the  work  of  translation,  their  activities  in  this 
direction  could  not  disguise  the  fact  that  the 
time  for  the  development  of  European  literature 
upon  a  common  basis  of  interests  and  aspirations 
had  forever  gone  by. 

If  we  take  a  broad  view  of  the  three  centuries 
from  the  sixteenth  to  the  eighteenth  inclusive, 
we  shall  see  that  for  the  history  of  literature  they 
were  centuries  of  nearly  independent  development 
in  the  five  countries  that  really  count.  National 
interactions  there  were,  no  doubt,  such  as  the 
influence  of  Italian  upon  English  literature,  or  of 
French  upon  German  literature,  but  these  were 
on  the  whole  superficial,  and  did  not  in  any  case 
seriously  modify  the  bent  of  the  national  genius. 
Even  the  unifying  influence  of  the  classical  heri- 
tage could  not  avail  to  accomplish  such  a  result. 
This  statement  needs  no  further  proof  than  is 
offered  by  a  comparison  between  the  treatment 
of  classical  subjects  by  Shakespeare  and  his  fel- 
lows, on  the  one  hand,  and  by  the  French  dram- 
atists, from  Corneille  to  Voltaire,  on  the  other. 
And  when  we  remember  that  it  is  not  much  more 


Literature  and  Criticism         37 

than  a  hundred  years  since  Shakespeare  received 
adequate  recognition  in  Germany,  or  any  sort  of 
recognition  in  France,  that  it  is  even  less  than  a 
hundred  years  since  Dante  came  to  his  own  in 
the  hearts  of  Englishmen  and  Frenchmen  and 
Germans,  we  shall  realize  the  full  meaning  of 
the  decentralizing  process  of  modern  literary 
evolution.  We  now  speak  familiarly  of  Shake- 
speare and  Dante  as  belonging  to  the  literature 
of  the  world,  but  for  hundreds  of  years  they 
belonged  only  to  the  literatures  of  their  respective 
peoples. 

Although  world  literature  as  a  fact  has  a  history 
of  many  centuries,  —  a  history  which  covers  the 
whole  classical  and  mediaeval  period,  down  to  the 
development  of  the  modern  tongues  as  suitable 
organs  of  expression, —  world  literature  as  a  name 
is  of  rather  recent  birth.  In  other  words,  the 
point  of  critical  self-consciousness  at  which  the 
idea  assumed  definite  shape  was  not  reached  until 
very  modern  times.  Goethe  was  the  first,  we 
believe,  to  speak  of  the  world  literature,  which  to 
the  prophetic  view  was  even  then  shaping  itself 
anew  and  rising  upon  a  broader  foundation  than 
its  classical  prototype.      Goethe  also  expressed 


38  Editorial  Echoes 

the  belief  that  Germany  would  contribute  some 
share  of  this  new  literature  to  come,  a  belief  to 
which  he  of  all  men  was  best  justified  in  giving 
utterance,  for  his  is  the  one  name  since  Shake- 
speare's that  has  by  the  common  agreement  of 
posterity  been  added  to  the  list  of  the  world's 
literary  immortals.  Since  Goethe's  time,  the 
idea  has  taken  shape  in  many  minds,  and  every 
decade  of  the  past  century  has  seen  the  conditions 
grow  more  favorable  under  which  a  world  litera- 
ture in  his  sense  is  possible. 

Let  us  inquire  a  little  into  these  conditions. 
Some  of  them  have  to  us  the  familiarity  of  the 
commonplace,  although  they  were  startling  nov- 
elties not  so  very  long  ago.  The  linking  together 
of  the  continents  by  electric  wires  and  steel  rails, 
the  new  means  of  transportation  which  have 
made  of  travel  at  once  a  delight  and  an  easily- 
attainable  method  of  self-cultivation,  the  multipli- 
cation and  cheapening  of  printed  matter  whereby 
the  news  of  the  whole  world  is^  brought  to  us 
with  little  delay  —  these  are  the  conditions  that 
obviously  suggest  themselves,  and  it  is  plain  to 
see  that  they  have  accomplished  great  things  for 
the  solidarity  of  mankind.      But  this  solidarity  of 


Literature  and  Criticism 


39 


sympathetic  interest  has  for  its  necessary  con- 
comitant the  solidarity  of  intellectual  effort  that 
is  attested  in  so  many  ways,  in  cooperative  move- 
ments and  congresses,  in  broad  educational  pro- 
grammes, in  the  increase  of  friendly  intercourse 
among  the  peoples,  and  in  the  general  growth  of 
the  cosmopolitan  spirit.  Under  these  modern 
conditions,  the  sort  of  world  literature  that 
Goethe  had  in  mind  has  been  shaping  itself  in 
spite  of  the  barriers  of  language  that  tend  to  re- 
strict the  free  communication  of  ideas.  This 
difficulty  is  overcome  partly  by  translations,  and 
partly  by  a  frank  recognition  of  the  fact  that  an 
educated  man  in  our  time  must  be  able  to  read 
freely  at  least  two  modern  languages  besides  his 
own.  Neither  of  these  agencies  alone  would 
suffice,  but  taken  together  they  work  wonders. 
Given  a  trained  minority  of  students,  all  the  time 
exploring  and  reporting  upon  contemporary  for- 
eign literature,  given  also  a  public  of  readers 
who  have  acquired  the  habit  of  looking  abroad 
for  ideas  and  inspirations,  and  no  significant  mes- 
sage uttered  anywhere  in  Christendom  can  long 
escape  the  attention  of  cultivated  mankind.  In 
Goethe's  own  later  years,  his  dictum  was  strik- 


40  Editorial  Echoes 

ingly  illustrated  by  the  European  vogue  of  Byron, 
and  all  through  the  century,  now  by  Heine,  now 
by  Hugo,  now  by  many  another  writer,  the  free 
currency  of  thought  that  has  made  for  a  world 
literature  in  Goethe's  sense  has  appeared  among 
the  most  insistent  phenomena  of  the  age. 

Finally,  glancmg  at  the  intellectual  life  of  the 
present  time,  we  find  corroborations  of  our  thesis 
upon  every  hand.  To  say  nothing  of  the  work 
done  in  science  and  general  scholarship,  which 
becomes  the  common  property  of  scholars  every- 
where almost  from  the  moment  of  its  first  pub- 
lication, we  may  find  in  the  field  of  literature 
proper  all  the  evidence  we  need.  One  has  only 
to  mention  the  names  of  Bjornson,  Ibsen,  Tol- 
stoy, Sienkiewicz^  Hauptmann,  Sudermann, 
Maeterlinck,  and  Zola,  to  make  it  clear  that  con- 
temporary literature,  in  its  higher  ranges  and 
when  occupied  with  large  ideas,  knows  no  barriers 
of  race  or  speech,  and  has  the  whole  world  for 
its  readers.  It  is  a  particularly  impressive  fact 
that  of  the  men  just  mentioned,  the  two  who 
would  by  almost  unanimous  consent  be  singled 
out  as  world-writers  par  excellence  write  their 
books  in  languages  that  lie  outside  the  province 


Literature  and  Criticism         41 

of  the  most  liberal  education,  and  are  known 
only  in  translations  to  the  world  at  large.  There 
is  no  writer  living  to-day  who  is  making  world 
literature  of  the  permanent  sort  for  which  the 
names  of  Dante  and  Shakespeare  stand,  but  there 
are  numerous  writers  whose  envisagement  of  the 
chief  aspects  of  modern  civilization  is  so  sincere 
and  profound  that  they  can  command  almost 
equally  the  attention  of  readers  in  all  countries, 
and  fairly  deserve  to  be  called  world-writers. 
That  their  number  will  increase  rather  than 
diminish  during  the  present  century  is  a  pre- 
diction that  it  seems  reasonably  safe  to  make. 


42  Editorial  Echoes 


TWENTY   YEARS   OF  EUROPEAN 
LITERATURE,  1880-1900. 

When  we  get  far  enough  away  from  any  literary 
period  to  view  it  in  the  proper  perspective,  twenty 
years  does  not  seem  a  very  long  time.  That 
term  of  years  taken  almost  anywhere  in  a  past 
century  might,  except  for  the  purposes  of  inten- 
sive study,  be  summarized  in  a  few  words.  But 
when  the  twenty  years  in  question  are  those  that 
lie  just  back  of  the  immediate  present,  the  case 
is  different,  and  the  task  far  more  difficult.  We 
have  so  many  recollections  and  personal  associa- 
tions with  the  books  and  writers  of  the  period 
in  which  we  have  lived  that  it  is  not  easy  to  single 
out  the  things  that  call  for  special  mention.  We 
cannot  see  the  woods  for  the  trees.  We  are 
tempted  to  magnify  unimportant  happenings,  and 
to  attach  undue  importance  to  names  that  may 
be  clean  forgotten  a  generation  hence.  But, 
making  the  fullest  allowance  for  such  illusions 
as  arise  from  our  intimate  connection  with  the 


Literature  and  Criticism        43 

years  in  question,  we  cannot  help  thinking  that 
the  historian  of  the  far  distant  future  will  see  in 
the  closing  decades  of  the  nineteenth  century  a 
period  more  noticeable  than  others  of  equal 
length  for  the  rapidity  of  its  literary  development 
and  the  pronounced  character  of  the  changes 
which  it  has  witnessed.  One  of  its  most  marked 
characteristics  will  be  seen  to  have  been  the 
great  losses  which  it  has  sustained  in  the  death 
of  its  most  forceful  writers,  without  any  corres- 
ponding compensation  in  the  appearance  of  others 
capable  of  filling  the  vacant  places.  That  this 
is  true  of  both  American  and  English  literature, 
using  the  latter  term  in  its  narrow  sense,  will  ap- 
pear evident  upon  a  moment's  reflection.  In  the 
case  of  both  branches  of  literature  in  the  English 
language,  the  losses  of  the  last  twenty  years  have 
been  so  many  and  so  great,  the  new  writers  of 
real  force  so  few  and  far  between,  that  we  may 
well  ask  the  question  :  Whom  have  we  left  to 
present  to  the  century  upon  the  threshold  of 
which  we  are  now  standing  ?  Cleverness  and 
technical  mastery  are  indeed  offered  us  in  many 
forms  by  our  newer  writers ;  the  cleverness  is 
almost  preternatural  at  times,  and  the  technique 


44  Editorial  Echoes 

would  put  many  of  the  older  masters  to  blush. 
But  the  soul  of  literature  does  not  live  by  these 
qualities  alone,  and,  whatever  momentary  admi- 
ration they  may  arouse,  they  are  not  ultimately 
satisfactory.  Nothing  but  genius  gives  lasting 
satisfaction,  and  to  that  we  freely  pardon  those 
minor  defects  upon  which  pedagogues  are  wont 
to  frown.  Genius,  however,  is  coming  every 
year  to  be  a  rarer  commodity  in  English  litera- 
ture, and  the  deficiency  appears  startling  when 
we  contrast  the  conditions  of  to-day  with  those 
of  the  sixties  and  the  seventies. 

With  the  Continental  literatures  the  outlook 
is  not  quite  so  dark.  The  latter  part  of  the  cen- 
tury has  been  marked  by  a  strong  resurgence  of 
national  feeling  among  nearly  all  of  the  distinctive 
peoples  of  Europe.  Magyars  and  Czechs  are  no 
longer  content  to  be  merged  in  the  political  con- 
glomerate of  Austria.  Finns  and  Poles  resent 
with  increasing  vehemence  their  subjection  to 
Russian  influences.  Even  the  Norwegians  chafe 
under  the  enforced  union  with  their  Swedish 
kinsmen,  and  assert  their  own  separate  nation- 
ality in  every  possible  way.  Thirty  years  of 
imperial     Germany    have    really    accomplished 


Literature  and  Criticism         45 

much  for  that  unity  of  feeling  whicli  was  only  a 
dream  of  the  future  when  the  King  of  Prussia 
assumed  the  title  of  German  Emperor  in  the 
palace  at  Versailles.  Even  France,  throughout 
all  modern  history  more  unanimous  and  self- 
centred  than  the  other  nations  of  the  Continent, 
has  achieved  a  greater  solidarity  than, ever  before 
under  the  regime  of  the  Republic.  The  Medi- 
terranean countries,  also,  have  shared  in  this 
renewal  of  national  feeling,  of  which  evidence 
may  be  adduced  from  the  recent  history  of 
Greece,  Italy,  and  Spain  alike.  This  fortifica- 
tion of  race  sentiment,  which  has  played  havoc 
with  so  many  political  ambitions,  has  proved 
highly  stimulating  to  literary  activity. 

Let  us  enumerate  a  few  of  the  developments 
of  Continental  literature  during  the  past  twenty 
years,  indicating  at  the  same  time  some  of  the 
losses  that  have  been  sustained.  Taking  first 
the  outlying  countries,  as  distinguished  from 
France  and  Germany,  which  represent  the  core 
of  present-day  Continental  culture,  the  following 
are  among  the  more  conspicuous  facts  to  claim 
our  attention.  There  has  arisen  in  Spain  a 
distinctively  modern  school  of  fiction,  which  has 


46  Editorial  Echoes 

justly  challenged  the  admiration  of  the  reading 
world.  It  is  true  that  Alarcon  and  Seiior  Galdos 
occupied  the  field  for  some  years  before  the 
period  with  which  we  are  dealing,  but  even  Senor 
Galdos,  in  his  later  manner,  is  a  very  different 
person  from  the  author  of  his  earlier  series  of 
books  concerned  with  the  romance  of  Spanish 
history,  and,  taken  in  connection  with  Senores 
Valera  and  Valdes,  with  Senora  Bazan,  and  with 
the  dramatist,  Senor  Echegaray,  he  marks  a  tran- 
sition in  the  spirit  of  Spanish  literature  which 
affords  the  plainest  evidence  that  contemporary 
Spanish  thought  is  no  longer  bound  to  the  tradi- 
tions of  the  past,  but  takes  an  active  interest  in  . 
all  the  problems  of  the  modern  world.  In  Italy, 
the  modern  movement,  although  it  offers  the 
unhealthful  phase  illustrated  by  the  work  of 
Signor  d'Annunzio,  offers  also  the  sane  devel- 
opments represented  by  Signor  de  Amicis,  Signor 
Fogazzaro,  and  Signor  Verga.  Signor  Carducci 
remains  what  he  has  been  for  the  last  thirty  or 
forty  years,  the  one  great  Italian  poet  of  our 
time,  great,  that  is,  in  a  sense  that  provokes 
comparison  with  the  best  that  any  literature  has 
to  give  us.    In  Hungary,  Dr.  Jokai,  full  of  years 


Literature  and  Criticism        47 

and  honors,  is  the  one  writer  who  is  generally 
known  to  readers  everywhere ;  none  of  the 
younger  men  have  thus  far  attracted  much  atten- 
tion outside  of  their  own  country.  Belgium  is 
so  closely  affiliated  with  France  that  its  writers 
do  not  appeal  to  us  especially  as  Belgians  ;  but  to 
this  statement  there  is  the  one  noteworthy  ex- 
ception of  M.  Maeterlinck,  whose  work  has  had 
much  vogue  of  recent  years,  and  is  particularly 
interesting  on  account  of  the  way  in  which  it 
illustrates  some  of  the  more  exaggerated  tenden- 
cies of  what  is  called  symbolism.  M.  Maeter- 
linck writes  in  the  French  language  ;  the  only 
living  writer  of  Flemish  generally  known  to 
English  readers  is  the  Dutch  novelist,  Heer 
Couperus,  whose  problem  fictions  have  had  a 
deserved  success  outside  of  Holland.  That 
charming  Dutch  novelist  who  chooses  to  write 
under  the  name  of  '  Maarten  Maartens '  has 
made  himself  practically  an  English  novelist  by 
writing  his  books  in  our  own  language.  It  is 
within  very  recent  years,  that  is,  within  the  last 
decade,  that  the  astonishing  novels  of  Mr.  Sien- 
kiewicz  have  come  to  be  known  throughout  the 
world,  and  have  restored  Poland  to  the  literary 


48  Editorial  Echoes 

map  of  Europe,  although  the  political  map  has 
no  place  for  it.  It  would  hardly  be  an  exaggera- 
tion to  describe  this  writer  as  the  most  remark- 
able genius  who  has  appeared  in  Continental 
hterature  during  the  period  which  we  are  now 
reviewing.  In  his  work  the  consciousness  of  a 
noble  race  becomes  intimately  revealed  to  us  — 
more  intimately,  in  fact,  than  in  the  poems  of 
Mickiewicz,  or  even  in  the  music  of  Chopin  — 
and  the  great  part  played  by  Poland  in  the  history 
of  Europe  is  made  known  to  us.  When  we 
turn  to  Russia,  our  first  thought  is  of  the  fact 
that  TourgueniefF  was  living  and  writing  twenty 
years  ago,  and  of  the  irreparable  loss  to  literature 
when  he  died  in  1883.  Since  then  the  one  great 
name  in  Russian  literature  has  been  that  of 
Count  Tolstoy,  but  even  of  him,  writing  from 
a  literary  rather  than  from  a  sociological  point 
of  view,  one  is  compelled  to  say,  stat  magnt 
nominis  umbra -^  for  'Anna  Karenina '  was  pub- 
lished in  1877, and  since  then  the  author's  foot- 
steps have  been  straying  erratically  about  in  the 
morass  of  didacticism.  In  the  Scandinavian 
countries,  the  most  important  happening  of  the 
last  twenty  years  has  been  the  immense  widening 


Literature  and  Criticism        49 

of  the  bounds, of  Dr.  Ibsen's  reputation.  Although 
for  thirty  years  he  had  been  producing  play  after 
play,  including  those  great  works  upon  which 
his  fame  will. chiefly  rest  when  the  final  account 
is  taken,  his  name  was  practically  unknown  in 
1880,  except  in  Germany,  outside  of  the  Scan- 
dinavian kingdoms.  It  was  in  1879  that  Mr. 
Gosse,  in  his  '  Studies  in  the  Literature  of 
Northern  Europe,'  first  called  the  attention  of 
English  readers  to  the  writer  who  has  since 
become  so  widely  read.  Until  well  along  in 
the  eighties  we  never  heard  the  name  of  Dr. 
Ibsen  mentioned  in  this  country,  either  in  con- 
versation or  in  print.  Herr  Bjornson  had  for 
many  years  been  known  to  our  public  as  the 
author  of  certain  idyllic  tales  of  Norwegian 
peasant  life,  although  even  he  was  entirely  un- 
known as  dramatist  or  as  lyric  poet.  The  great 
widening  of  Dr.  Ibsen's  reputation  coincided 
rather  closely  with  the  great  change  in  method 
and  subject-matter  which  came  over  his  work 
about  twenty  years  ago.  In  1880  'The  Pillars 
of  Society '  was  three  years  old,  and  '  A  Doll 
Home '  had  been  published  only  the  year  before. 

It  is  upon  these  two  plays,  and  their  ten  suc- 
4 


50  Editorial  Echoes 

cessors,  all  dealing  with  the  problems  of  modern 
society,  that  the  author's  reputation  is  even  now 
chiefly  based,  a  caprice  of  popular  judgment 
which  completely  ignores  his  real  masterpieces. 
The  same  caprice  of  popular  judgment,  which 
we  do  not  believe  that  time  will  justify,  makes 
of  him  at  present  a  more  conspicuous  figure  than 
his  great  Norwegian  contemporary.  But,  how- 
ever these  critical  values  may  be  readjusted  by 
the  coming  generation,  there  is  no  doubt  that  for 
the  present  generation  Dr.  Ibsen  represents  one 
of  the  strongest  influences  now  operating  in  lit- 
erature. In  Danish  literature,  perhaps  the  most 
important  name  of  the  last  twenty  years  has  been 
that  of  Dr.  Georg  Brandes,  which  fact  is  par- 
ticularly interesting  as  a  revendication  of  the 
claims  of  criticism  to  consideration  as  one  of  the 
branches  of  literature  proper.  It  is  a  somewhat 
noteworthy  fact  that  in  one  country,  at  least, 
a  literary  critic  should  remain  for  a  long  term  of 
years  its  foremost  man  of  letters.  We  should 
not,  however,  fail  to  mention  among  the  famous 
Danish  writers  now  living  the  name  of  Herr 
Holger  Drachmann,  who  as  poet  and  novelist 
preserves  the  romantic  tradition,  and  displays  the 


Literature  and  Criticism         51 

most  surprising  versatility  of  genius.  He  has 
been  called  the  Danish  Heine,  and  when  we 
consider  both  his  lyrical  gift  and  his  sturdy 
championship  of  liberal  ideas,  the  comparison  is 
not  so  far  astray.  In  Swedish  literature,  the 
most  conspicuous  loss  of  the  past  twenty  years 
came  with  the  death  of  Victor  Rydberg,  whose 
influence  for  culture  and  the  higher  ideals  of 
living  has  been  likened  to  that  of  Matthew 
Arnold. 

German  literature  in  1880  had  no  poets  worth 
speaking  of,  unless  we  mention  a  few  such 
writers  as  Geibel,  Bodenstedt,  Fontane,  and  the 
author  of  '  Der  Trompeter  von  Sakkingen.'  It 
had,  however,  an  important  group  of  novelists 
in  Auerbach  and  Freytag,  Herr  Spielhagen  and 
Herr  Heyse.  To-day,  as  in  1880,  we  still  think 
of  Heine  as  the  last  of  the  great  German  poets, 
although  a  few,  perhaps,  may  claim  for  the  author 
of  '  Die  Versunkene  Glocke '  the  poetic  laurel. 
Although  Herr  Spielhagen  and  Herr  Heyse  are 
still  living  and  writing,  their  pristine  fires  are  now 
little  more  than  embers,  and  there  can  be  no 
doubt  that  Herr  Hauptmann  now  occupies  the 
most  conspicuous  place  in  German  letters.     For 


52  Editorial  Echoes 

some  years  the  race  was  close  between  him  and 
Herr  Sudermann,  but  at  present  he  seems  to 
have  outdistanced  his  only  serious  competitor. 
The  prominence  of  these  two  writers,  who  are 
distinctly  the  most  serious  representatives  of  the 
Young  Germany  of  letters,  is  important  not  only 
because  of  the  intrinsic  value  of  their  writing, 
which  is  considerable,  but  also  because  they  have 
given  a  new  impulse  to  that  form  of  the  drama 
which  is  both  huhnenmdsztg  and  literary.  This 
modern  rehabilitation  of  the  acting  drama  as  a 
form  of  literary  art  has  been  going  on  in  several 
countries,  but  in  no  other,  not  even  in  France, 
as  noticeably  as  in  Germany.  The  respect  with 
which  the  playhouse  and  its  associations  are 
treated  in  that  country  represents  one  of  the  most 
important  things  that  Germany  is  now  doing  for 
literature.  But  in  spite  of  all  that  we  may  say 
in  behalf  of  recent  German  literature,  the  fact 
must  be  recognized  that  the  Empire  has  not,  in 
the  thirty  years  of  its  existence,  accomplished  as 
much  as  might  reasonably  have  been  expected. 
The  output  has  been  enormous,  but  mediocrity 
has  characterized  the  greater  part  of  it.  It  is 
only  now  and  then  that  a  poem  or  a  book,  a  play 


Literature  and  Criticism         53 

or  a  critical  monograph,  has  risen  above  that  dead 
level ;  very  little  of  the  German  literature  pro- 
duced during  the  past  twenty  years  has  won  for 
itself  that  wide  cosmopolitan  hearing  for  which 
no  really  important  work,  in  our  age  of  alert 
publishing  and  quickly  diffused  intelligence,  has 
long  to  wait.  Before  closing  this  paragraph,  we 
should  say  a  word  about  the  influence  exerted  by 
the  writings  of  Nietzsche.  That  influence  has 
been  unwholesome  and  demoralizing,  but  it  must 
be  reckoned  with  in  any  attempt  to  trace  the 
main  currents  of  contemporary  thought. 

The  French  literature  of  the  past  twenty  years 
resembles  our  own  in  the  balance  of  its  gains  and 
losses,  the  form'er  having  been  by  no  means 
commensurate  with  the  latter.  The  greatest 
French  writer  of  the  century  has  died  within  the 
period  under  consideration,  and  such  was  his 
vitality,  and  such  the  astonishing  fertility  of  his 
genius,  that  even  his  octogenarian  years  did  not 
preclude  him,  up  to  the  very  last,  from  contin- 
uing to  enrich  the  treasure  house  of  French  song. 
The  death  of  Leconte  de  Lisle,  although  far  less 
significant  than  that  of  Hugo,  was  still  a  heavy 
loss  to  French  poetry,  and  there  are  many  per- 


54  Editorial  Echoes 

sons  to  whom  the  wayward  and  poignant  note 
struck  from  the  lyre  of  Paul  Verlaine  came  with 
a  fresh  charm  that  ma-kes  them  sincere  mourners 
of  his  death.  Next  to  Victor  Hugo,  the  greatest 
loss  of  French  literature  during  the  period  under 
consideration  was  felt  when  Renan  passed  away 
in  1892,  within  a  few  days  of  the  death  of  the 
greatest  of  our  English  poets.  The  death  of  Taine, 
soon  thereafter,  was  also  an  event  of  more  than 
common  significance.  Taine  and  Renan,  how- 
ever, had  lived  their  lives  and  done  their  work. 
But  it  was  the  promise,  even  more  than  the 
achievement,  of  James  Darmesteter  that  lent  a 
peculiar  touch  of  sadness  to  his  premature  taking- 
ofF.  French  literature  has  also*  lost  the  younger 
Dumas,  Augier,  Labiche,  Feuillet,  Daudet,  Mau- 
passant, and  Cherbuliez.  Flaubert  died  in  1880, 
at  the  very  beginning  of  the  period  now  under 
discussion.  It  is  obvious  that  no  such  men  are 
now  left  to  French  literature  as  those  that  have 
been  taken  away.  To  set  off  against  the  name 
of  Hugo  we  have  the  names  of  MM.  Sully- 
Prudhomme  and  Coppee.  Against  the  names 
of  the  older  dramatists  we  have  those  of  MM. 
Sardou  and  Rostand.     To  take  the  place  of  the 


Literature  and  Criticism         55 

lost  novelists  we  have  M.  Zola, —  v^^hose  present 
notoriety  will  not  avail  to  save  his  literary  repu- 
tation,—  M.  'Loti,'  M.  Bourget,  M.  Rod,  and  a 
host  of  other  excellent  second-rate  men.  We 
have  also,  indeed,  M.  Anatole  France,  that  well- 
nigh  impeccable  prosateur^  but  even  his  name 
cannot  go  far  toward  restoring  the  lost  balance. 
The  French  literature  of  the  past  twenty  years 
has  been  as  prolific  as  ever,  as  far  as  the  main 
departments  of  belles-lettres  are  concerned,  but 
very  few  works  in  any  of  these  departments 
command  our  attention  by  their  preeminent 
excellence.  There  has  been  a  noteworthy  move- 
ment in  poetry,  in  the  direction  of  what  is  vaguely 
known  as  '  symbolism,'  much  discussed  by  those 
who  affect  the  cult,  but  not  to  be  considered 
very  seriously  by  those  who  are  concerned  for 
the  higher  interests  of  French  literature.  The 
movement  seems  to  be  characterized  by  an 
impatience  of  all  artistic  restraint,  a  revolt  against 
the  chief  canons  of  poetical  form,  a  somewhat 
sickly  cast  of  thought,  and  a  tendency  to  exalt 
little  men  to  the  rank  of  great  masters.  This 
tendency  is,  of  course,  exhibited  chiefly  within 
the  limits  of  its  own  clique  of  mutual  admirers, 


56  Editorial  Echoes 

and  is  not  characteristic  of  sober  criticism,  as 
represented  by  such  men  as  MM.  Brunetiere 
and  Faguet.  In  other  words,  there  is  in  the 
France  of  to-day,  as  in  every  other  country  of 
Europe,  a  group  of  jeunes^  who  are  trying  all 
sorts  of  unregulated  experiments  in  verse  and 
prose,  who  are  making  a  great  pother  about  their 
doings,  and  who  are  minutely  subdivided  into 
little  parties  and  sects,  united  only  in  their  com- 
mon endeavor  to  accomplish  great  things  with 
small  intellectual  means.  Far  more  creditable 
to  the  contemporary  French  spirit  is  that  other 
and  broader  movement  of  thought  which  has 
been  seeking,  ever  since  the  nadir  of  imperialism 
was  reached  thirty  years  ago,  to  regenerate  the 
moral  ideals  of  the  French  people,  and  to  restore 
the  atmosphere  of  earnestness  which  seemed  to 
have  been  lost.  How  nobly  Renan  and  Taine 
labored  to  this  end  is  matter  of  familiar  knowl- 
edge. Their  efforts  have  borne  fruit  in  the 
writings  of  Darmesteter  and  Guyau,  of  MM. 
Brunetiere,  Lavisse,  Wagner,  and  Rod,  and  of 
the  Vicomte  de  Vogiie.  If  this  movement  has 
in  some  cases  tended  toward  a  reactionary  neo- 
Catholicism,  its  net  outcome  has  been  for  good, 


Literature  and  Criticism         57 

and  its  influence  upon  the  younger  generation 
must  have  been  great,  if  not  at  the  present  time 
exactly  calculable. 

Turning  now  to  English  literature  —  our  own 
literature  upon  the  other  side  of  the  ocean  —  the 
capital  fact  confronts  us  that  in  1880  there  were 
six  great  English  poets  among  the  living,  and  that 
in  1900  there  remained  but  one.  During  the 
twenty  years  Tennyson  and  Browning,  Rossetti 
and  Morris  and  Arnold,  all  passed  away,  leaving 
Mr.  Swinburne  in  exalted  isolation,  the  only  great 
poet  of  the  nineteenth  century  who  we  may 
hope  will  live  to  carry  far  on  into  the  twentieth 
its  glorious  literary  tradition.  Our  age  of  gold 
has  to  all  seeming  reached  an  end,  and  Mr.  Sted- 
man,  who  a  quarter  of  a  century  ago  recognized 
in  the  years  of  the  Victorian  reign  a  distinct  lit- 
erary period  which  even  then  showed  signs  of 
drawing  to  a  close,  must  himself  be  a  little  sur- 
prised at  the  completeness  with  which  his  predic- 
tion has  been  borne  out  by  the  event.  In  the 
place  of  our  major  poets  we  have  now  only  minor 
ones,  and  the  fact  that  we  have  them  in  larger 
numbers  than  ever  before  offers  us  no  consola- 
tion for  the  loss  of  the  great  departed.     Aside 


58  Editorial  Echoes 

from  Mr.  Swinburne,  we  are  compelled  to  point, 
when  questioned  concerning  our  living  poets,  to 
Mr.  Aubrey  DeVere,  Mr.  George  Meredith,  Mr. 
Theodore  Watts-Dunton,  Mr.  Robert  Bridges, 
Mr.  William  Watson,  Mr.  Stephen  Phillips,  Mr. 
W.  B.  Yeats,  and  Mr.  Rudyard  Kipling.  We 
hold  these  men  in  esteem,  it  is  true,  but  however 
we  may  admire  the  delicate  art  of  Mr.  Bridges, 
for  example,  or  the  resonant  virility  of  Mr.  Kip- 
ling, our  sense  of  proportion  does  not  permit  us 
to  set  these  men  upon  anything  like  the  plane 
occupied  by  the  great  poets  who  have  died  since 
1880.  And,  with  but  few  exceptions,  our  living 
poets  seem  to  be  no  more  than  '  little  sonnet- 
men,' 

*  Who  fashion,  in  a  shrewd,  mechanic  way, 

Songs  without  souls  that  flicker  for  a  day, 

To  vanish  in  irrevocable  night." 

Prose  fiction-of  some  sort  or  other  we  have  always 
with  us,  and  the  names  of  Mr.  Meredith  and  Mr. 
Hardy  would  lend  distinction  to  any  period,  but 
the  great  age  of  the  Victorian  novelists  ended 
with  the  death  of '  George  Eliot'  in  1881.  Al- 
though frequently  compared  with  that  woman  of 
genius,  Mrs.  Ward  may  hardly  be  said  to  fill  her 


Literature  and  Criticism         59 

place.  Since  her  death  we  have  also  lost  Lord 
Beaconsfield,  Troliope,  Black,  Blackmore,  and 
Stevenson.  When  we  turn  to  the  great  writers 
of  prose,  the  contrast  between  the  living  and  the 
dead  is  seen  to  be  almost  as  pronounced  as  in  the 
case  of  the  poets.  Within  twenty  years,  Carlyle 
and  Ruskin,  by  far  the  greatest  prosateurs  of  our 
time,  have  ceased  to  appeal  to  us  with  the  living 
voice.  The  persuasive  eloquence  of  Newman 
and  Martineau  has  been  hushed,  and  the  plea  for 
culture,  voiced  in  such  dulcet  terms  by  Arnold 
and  Pater,  is  no  longer  heard.  All  these  men 
are  now  among 

*  The  dead,  but  sceptred  sovereigns,  who  still  rule 
Our  spirits  from  their  urns,' 

but  to  whose  counsel  we  may  no  longer  turn 
when  new  questions  arise  and  call  for  new  solu- 
tions. Of  the  four  great  men  of  science  who 
have  caught  the  ear  of  the  general  public  during 
the  past  twenty  years,  and  whose  teachings  have 
wrought  so  complete  a  change  in  the  attitude  of 
all  thinking  men  toward  the  claims  of  scientific 
culture,  and  the  place  of  science  in  education, 
Mr.  Herbert  Spencer  alone  remains  to  us.  Dar- 
win, Huxley,  and  Tyndall  have  died,  but  happily 


6o  Editorial  Echoes 

they  lived  long  enough  to  witness  the  general 
acceptance  of  the  ideas  for  which  they  fought  so 
good  a  fight,  and  to  be  assured  that  the  evolu- 
tionary principle  had  won  for  itself  the  suffrages 
of  all  whose  judgment  was  worth  having.  The 
older  school  of  historical  writing,  as  represented 
by  Green  and  Froude,  has  given  place  to  the 
school  represented  by  Dr.  Gardiner  and  the 
Bishop  of  Oxford.  The  scholarship  of  these 
men  is  no  doubt  deeper  and  more  accurate  than 
was  that  of  their  predecessors,  but  their  '  litera- 
ture '  is  sadly  to  seek,  and  their  influence  conse- 
quently restricted.  The  general  reader  with  a 
taste  for  this  sort  of  writing  does  not  turn  to  the 
^  Select  Charters,'  but  rather  takes  down  from 
the  shelf  his  well-worn  'Short  History  of  the 
English  People,'  and  is  not  particularly  con- 
cerned with  the  fact  that  later  research  has  inval- 
idated some  of  its  positions.  The  two  most 
conspicuous  cases  of  personal  success  achieved 
in  English  authorship  during  the  past  twenty  years 
have  been  those  of  Stevenson  and  Mr.  Kipling. 
Both  afford  striking  illustrations  of  the  'craze' 
in  literature.  A  few  years  ago  we  were  told  by 
many  enthusiastic  readers  that  in  Stevenson  the 


Literature  and  Criticism        61 

great  masters  of  our  fiction  had  found  a  worthy 
successor.  More  recently  we  have  been  assured 
that  Mr.  Kipling  is  a  great  poet,  and  the  ill- 
considered  laudations  of  his  admirers  have  been 
dinned  into  our  ears.  Such  outbursts  of  uncritical 
applause  always  make  the  judicious  grieve,  but 
their  effect  soon  wears  away,  and  the  men  who 
occasion  them  come  to  be  viewed  in  the  proper 
perspective.  Stevenson  has  already  taken  his 
place  as  an  entertaining  novelist  of  the  second  or 
third  class,  and  his  singularly  lovable  personality 
is  not  now  mistaken  for  literary  genius  by  any 
great  number  of  persons.  Mr.  Kipling,  likewise, 
is  fast  coming  to  be  viewed  as  a  member  of  the 
considerable  company  of  the  minor  poets  of  to- 
day, and  his  essential  message,  the  more  closely 
we  examine  it,  is  found  to  make  much  of  its 
appeal  to  the  more  vulgar  tastes  and  the  baser 
instincts  of  human  nature.  Mr.  Stephen  Phillips 
is  the  latest  of  the  '  new  poets '  who  are  discov- 
ered and  exploited  now  and  then  by  English 
critics,  and  there  is  no  reason  thus  far  apparent 
why  his  case  should  not  parallel  that  of  all  the 
others.  He  has,  no  doubt,  an  exceptional  gift  of 
refined  poetic  expression,  but  there  is  no  distinct- 


62  Editorial  Echoes 

ively  new  note  in  his  song ;  there  is  merely  a 
new  blending  of  the  notes  which  are  already 
familiar  to  us.  To  illustrate  what  is  really  meant 
by  a  new  note  in  English  song  we  must  go  back 
to  Rossetti's  'Poems'  of  1870,  or  to  1866  and 
the  first  volume  of  Mr.  Swinburne's  '  Poems  and 
Ballads.'  The  past  two  decades  have  witnessed 
no  such  event  in  English  literature  as  was  marked 
by  the  appearance  of  either  of  the  volumes  just 
mentioned.  When  we  contrast  the  period  of  the 
sixties  and  seventies  with  the  period  of  the  eighties 
and  nineties  we  may  realize  all  the  difference  be- 
tween a  period  in  which  the  creative  imagination 
is  at  full  tide,  and  a  period  in  which  the  flood  of 
genius  is  fast  ebbing  away.  In  the  later  of  the 
two  periods  English  literature  has  rounded  out 
the  great  work  of  the  earlier ;  as  the  great  writers 
have  died,  only  lesser  ones  have  appeared  to  take 
their  places  ;  and  many  of  the  younger  men,  rec- 
ognizing the  futility  of  any  attempt  to  carry  on 
the  old  tradition  upon  its  old  lines,  have  become 
mere  experimenters  in  new  moods  and  forms, 
hoping  to  hit  upon  some  promising  line  of  new 
literary  endeavor,  but  not  as  yet  indicating  with 
any  precision  the  direction  which  will  be  taken 


Literature  and  Criticism         63 

by  the  movement  of  the  coming  century.  This 
restlessness,  this  confusion  of  ideals,  and  this 
uncertainty  of  aim  are  the  unmistakable  marks  of 
a  transition  period  in  literature.  A  remarkable 
age  has  rounded  to  its  close,  and  it  is  impossible 
to  determine  with  any  assurance  whether  the  age 
to  come  will  be  merely  critical  and  sterile,  or 
whether  it  will  give  birth  to  some  new  creative 
impulse. 

What  has  just  been  said  of  the  last  years  of 
our  English  literature  is  generally  true  of  litera- 
ture throughout  the  world.  Its  activities  are 
everywhere  largely  experimental ;  most  of  the 
younger  writers  in  all  countries  appear  to  be  con- 
vinced that  their  only  hope  of  making  a  mark 
lies  in  the  discovery  of  new  methods  and  new 
forms.  We  seem  to  be  living  in  an  age  of  literary 
anarchy,  in  which  every  sort  of  excess  or  extrav- 
agance claims  a  hearing.  There  are  schools 
and  sects  and  cliques  everywhere,  but  there  are 
no  controlling  principles.  This  aggressive  and 
unregulated  individualism  even  seeks  to  bend 
criticism  to  its  heterogeneous  aims  by  denying 
the  very  principle  of  critical  authority.  It  pre- 
tends that  the  belief  in  critical  canons  is  a  super- 


64  Editorial  Echoes 

stition,  and  that  individual  liking  is  the  only  test 
of  good  literature.    Impressionism  in  criticism  is 
so  far  in  the  ascendant   that   many   people  ho 
longer  find  intelligible  the  point  of  view  from 
which  a  critic  can  say  of  a  composition  that  he 
likes  it  personally,  but  that  it  is  nevertheless  bad 
literature.      Yet  this  is  the  point  of  view  that 
every  critic  must  at  times  be  prepared  to  take,  if 
he  have  any  regard  for  the  seriousness  of  his 
calling.     Few  critics  have  ever  so  succeeded  in 
eliminating    the    personal    equation    from    their 
make-up  as  to  bring  about  an  absolute  alignment 
between  their  subjective  impressions  and  their 
objective  judgments.     In  the  presence  of  all  the 
diversity   of  purpose   exhibited   in    the    literary 
activity  of  recent  years,  and  of  all  the  diversity 
of  critical  opinion  with  which  it  has  been  greeted, 
the  search  for  any  principle  of  unity  becomes 
well-nigh  hopeless.    There  is,  however,  one  fairly 
comprehensive  statement  which  may  be  made, 
and  upon  which  we  are  justified  in  placing  con- 
siderable emphasis.     The  European  literature  of 
the  last  twenty  years  has  been  more  distinctly 
sociological  in  character  than  the  literature  of 
any  preceding  period.    The  social  consciousness 


Literature  and  Criticism        65 

has  been  aroused  as  never  before,  and  the  com- 
plex relations  of  men  and  women,  both  to  each 
other  and  to  society  in  the  aggregate,  have  sup- 
plied themes  for  a  constantly  increasing  number 
of  novels  and  poems  and  plays.  A  large  propor- 
tion of  the  writers  who  have  been  named  in  the 
foregoing  pages  illustrate  some  phase  of  this  new 
or,  at  least,  heightened  sense  of  the  duties  of 
human  beings  toward  one  another.  It  was  more 
than  accidental,  it  was  rather  in  obedience  to  an 
irresistible  tendency  of  human  thought,  that  such 
men  as  Ruskin,  Count  Tolstoy,  Herr  Bjornson, 
and  Dr.  Ibsen  turned  at  about  the  same  time, 
and  with  a  common  motive,  from  the  past  to  the 
present,  from  the  romantic  to  the  real,  from  work 
in  which  the  aesthetical  element  was  predominant 
to  work  in  which  the  ethical  element  was  set, 
sometimes  far  too  obtrusively,  in  the  foreground. 
This  movement  resulted  in  a  manifest  loss  to 
art,  but  it  has  accomplished  much  for  the  better- 
ment of  mankind.  The  change  of  aim  and 
method  which  in  these  writers  marks  so  sharp  a 
contrast  between  their  earlier  and  their  later  work 
is  paralleled  in  many  other  writers  of  less  import- 
ance.   And  many  of  the  younger  men,  following 


66  Editorial  Echoes 

the  biological  law  which  makes  the  development 
of  the  individual  to  a  certain  extent  an  epitome 
of  the  development  of  the  race,  have  started 
upon  their  career  as  idealists,  only  to  succumb, 
after  a  few  preliminary  flights,  to  the  tendency 
which  has  done  so  much  to  make  of  modern 
literature  the  handmaid  of  social  analysis  and 
ethical  reform.  The  interests  of  pure  literature 
have  suffered  in  this  transforming  process;  but 
life  is  even  more  important  than  literature,  and 
it  is  possible  that  the  final  reckoning  will  show 
the  gains  to  have  balanced  the  losses.  At  all 
events,  this  introduction  of  an  avowed  social  and 
ethical  purpose  into  nearly  all  sorts  of  writing  is 
the  most  characteristic  thing  that  the  last  twenty 
years  have  done  for  the  literature  of  the  world. 


Literature -and  Criticism        67 


THE   GREAT  BOOKS  OF  THE 
NINETEENTH   CENTURY. 

At  the  beginning  of  a  new  century  it  becomes 
proper  to  review  the  literature  of  the  century 
just  ended,  and  to  ask  what  books  have  exerted 
the  greatest  influence  upon  the  thought  of  the 
age.  The  inquiry  has  deep  and  enduring  interest, 
because  it  affords  one  way,  at  least,  and  probably 
the  most  important  way,  of  determining  what  the 
nineteenth  century  has  done  for  civilization.  We 
propose  to  confine  our  attention,  in  the  present 
article,  to  the  books  of  thought  as  distinguished 
from  the  books  of  art,  and  to  enumerate,  with 
some  sort  of  brief  accompanying  comment,  some 
of  the  works  of  the  century  that  may  fairly  be 
characterized  as  epoch-making ;  the  books,  in  a 
word,  that  have  opened  men's  eyes  to  a  deeper 
view  of  scientific  or  philosophical  truth,  and  have 
made  permanent  changes  in  the  current  of  human 
thought. 

Considered  in  this  respect,  the  book  of  the 


68  Editorial  Echoes 

century,  beyond  any  possibility  of  a  successful 
challenge  to  its  preeminence,  is  'The  Origin  of 
Species,'  by  Charles  Darwin.  The  influence  of 
this  book  ranks  it  with  the  treatises  of  Copernicus 
and  of  Newton,  with  the  '  Contrat  Social '  and 
the  '  Wealth  of  Nations.'  It  is  doubtful  if  any 
other  book,  in  all  the  history  of  modern  thought, 
has  been  so  far-reaching,  in  its  influence,  or  pro- 
ductive of  such  immense,  intellectual  results. 
There  is  a  difference,  not  merely  of  degree  but 
almost  of  kind,  between  the  intellectual  processes 
of  the  men  who  lived  before  Darwin  and  those 
who  have  grown  to  manhood  during  the  period 
in  which  the  evolutionary  leaven  has  been  work- 
ing in  men's  minds.  We  no  longer  think  in  the 
same  terms  as  of  old,  and  we  see  that  the  true 
measure  of  the  power  of  the  great  thinkers  of  the 
past  is  to  be  found  in  the  extent  to  which  their 
work  foreshadowed  or  anticipated  the  evolution- 
ary method. 

It  is  because  the  influence  of  Darwin  has  thus 
extended  far  beyond  the  biological  field  in  which 
his  work  was  done  that  his  most  famous  book 
stands  thus  preeminent.  Among  the  books  that 
have  proved  epoch-making   in   more  restricted 


Literature  and  Criticism         69 

fields  of  thought,  we  may  mention  Lyell's  ^  Prin- 
ciples of  Geology,'  Helmholtz's  '  Tonempfin- 
dungen/  Froebel's  '  Education  of  Man,'  Ruskin's 
'  Modern  Painters,'  and  Maine's  '  Ancient  Law/ 
The  science  of  comparative  philology,  which 
hardly  existed  before  the  nineteenth  century,  dates 
from  the  publication  of  Bopp's  '  Comparative 
Grammar ';  and  the  scientific  pursuit  of  historical 
scholarship,  whose  ideals  are  very  different  from 
those  of  the  eighteenth  century  historians,  although 
Gibbon  did  much  to  anticipate  them,  really  be- 
gan with  the  publication  of  Niebuhr's  '  Romische 
Geschichte.'  Dalton's  '  New  System  of  Chem- 
ical Philosophy  '  laid  the.  foundations  for  atomic 
chemistry,  and  the  ^  Mecanique  Celeste  '  of  La- 
place provided  a  firm  mathematical  basis  for  the 
nebular  theory,  previously  outlined,  it  is  true,  by 
Kant,  but  lacking  in  the  confirmation  that  was 
brought  to  it  by  the  masterly  analysis  of  the 
French  astronomer.  Here  is  also  the  appropriate 
place  for  mention  of  the  researches  of  Pasteur, 
which  have  proved  so  immensely  fruitful  in  the 
domain  of  bacteriology,  and  upon  which,  more 
than  upon  the  labors  of  any  other  investigator, 
the  new  science  is  based.     To  the  work  of  Pas- 


70  Editorial  Echoes 

teur  and  his  followers  we  owe  the  first  rational 
theory  of  disease  and  its  treatment  that  has  ever 
been  formulated,  a  somewhat  surprising  fact  when 
we  consider  the  paramount  importance  of  the  sub- 
ject to  mankind. 

What  were  once  supposed  to  be  the  founda- 
tions of  religious  belief  have,  during  the  century 
just  ended,  been  sapped  and  mined  by  many 
agencies.  The  study  of  ancient  civilizations  has 
proved  to  be  the  merest  fables  many  things  that 
the  credulous  earlier  ages  accepted  without 
question.  The  new  scientific  view  of  man  and 
nature  has  also  brought  about  a  silent  transfor- 
mation in  many  matters  of  opinion  once  thought 
to  be  indlssolubly  connected  with  religious  belief, 
but  now  seen  to  have  little  or  nothing  to  do  with 
it.  As  far  as  religion  is  a  question  of  the  inter- 
pretation of  the  Scriptures,  the  historical  methods 
that  have  dealt  so  effectively  with  Greek  and 
Roman  tradition  have  also  made  an  enduring 
impression  upon  the  traditions  of  the  Hebrew 
people  and  of  the  Christian  church.  The  'higher' 
criticism,  which  means  simply  the  new  historical 
criticism  of  sources  and  ideas,  has  triumphed  so 
completely  that  little  in  the  way  of  superstition 


Literature  and  Criticism         71 

is  left  for  it  to  slay.  Many  men  have  fought 
valiantly  in  this  cause,  and  it  is  difficult  to  specify 
individual  scholars.  But  if  our  test  be  that  of 
direct  influence  upon  great  numbers  of  people,  it 
is  probably  true  that  the  '  Leben  Jesu  '  of  Strauss 
and  the  '  Vie  de  Jesus '  of  Renan  have  been  the 
most  important  popular  agencies  in  bringing  about 
a  restoration  of  the  Christian  religion  to  its  proper 
place  in  the  perspective  of  general  history. 

In  the  domain  of  economics,  the  most  influ- 
ential book  of  the  century  has  probably  been  one 
whose  teachings  are  repudiated  by  those  vi^ho 
have  the  best  right  to  speak  in  the  name  of  this 
science.  The  propaganda  of  socialism  has  become 
so  marked  a  feature  in  the  political  life  of  most 
of  the  civilized  nations  that  it  cannot  be  ignored 
in  any  survey  of  the  tendencies  of  nineteenth 
century  thought,  and  credit  must  be  given  to  the 
book  vi^hich,  more  than  any  other,  has  been 
responsible  for  this  movement.  That  book,  it 
need  hardly  be  added,  is  the  '  Kapital '  of  Karl 
Marx  ;  and  its  force  is  not  yet  spent.  Indeed, 
we  are  inclined  to  think  that  fifty  years  hence  it 
will  loom  even  larger  than  it  now  does  among 
the  writings  that  have  most  profoundly  influenced 


72  Editorial  Echoes 

the  thought  of  modern  times.  For  the  socialist 
experiment  has  not  yet  worked  itself  out,  and  it 
will  not  be  discredited  until  civilization  has  suf- 
fered some  very  rude  shocks.  Mill's  '  Political 
Economy,'  on  the  other  hand,  while  it  has  pro- 
foundly influenced  the  real  thinkers  in  this  field, 
and  has  an  absolute  value  far  exceeding  that  of 
'  Das  Kapital,'  falls  short  of  being  an  epoch- 
making  book,  for  the  simple  reason  that,  instead 
of  setting  new  ideas  in  motion,  its  energy  was 
devoted  to  clarifying  the  old  ones,  and  to  setting 
them  forth  in  logical  arrangement.  It  is  still  the 
best  single  treatise  on  political  economy  that  has 
ever  been  written,  and  for  this,  at  least,  it  deserves 
an  honorable  place  in  any  review  of  the  intel- 
lectual history  of  the  nineteenth  century.  We 
are  inclined  to  give  a  place  in  this  connection  to 
the  writings  upon  political  and  social  subjects  of 
the  great  apostle  of  Italian  unity,  Giuseppe  Maz- 
zini.  It  is  not  merely  because  they  brought 
about  the  political  regeneration  of  his  own  country 
that  these  writings  are  of  the  highest  import- 
ance,-—  although  that  would  suffice  to  justify  the 
estimate,  —  but  rather  because  they  brought  the 
element  of  spirituality  into  the  discussions  with 


Literature  and  Criticism         73 

which  they  were  concerned,  and  supplemented  the 
conception  of  the  rights  of  man,  of  which  some- 
thing too  much  had  been  made  during  the  period 
that  followed  the  French  Revolution,  with  the 
hitherto  neglected  conception  of  the  duties  of 
man,  thus  giving  an  ethical  turn  to  the  general 
movement  of  European  emancipation,  and  allying 
it  with  something  higher  and  finer  than  merely 
material  interests.  The  teaching  of  Mazzini, 
enforced  by  the  singular  purity  and  nobility  of 
his  devoted  life,  has  had  a  widespread  influence 
upon  political  thought,  and  has  given  it  an  ethical 
impulse  that  would  be  difficult  to  overestimate. 
Turning  last  of  all  to  the  philosophers,  that 
is,  to  the  men  who,  as  far  as  may  be,  take  all 
knowledge  for  their  province,  and  seek  to  sys- 
tematize the  various  results  of  special  intellectual 
activity,  we  find  the  names  of  Humboldt,  Hegel, 
Schopenhauer,  Comte,  and  Mr.  Herbert  Spencer 
to  be  the  conspicuous  names  of  the  nineteenth 
century.  The  ^  Kosmos '  of  Alexander  von 
Humboldt  marks,  in  a  sense,  the  end  of  the 
period  of  general  scholarship  and  the  beginning 
of  the  period  in  which  specialization  has  held 
full  sway.     Never  again   can  anyone   hope   to 


74  Editorial  Echoes 

master  the  scientific  knowledge  of  his  time  in  the 
sense  in  which  Humboldt  mastered  it ;  even  the 
magnificent  achievement  of  Mr.  Spencer  falls 
short  of  thai  ideal  and  shows  the  futility  of  any 
further  endeavor  in  that  direction.  We  owe  to 
Mr.  Spencer  the  most  thorough-going  application 
of  the  conception  of  evolution  to  history  that  has 
ever  been  made,  and  that  is  glory  enough  for 
one  man ;  but  we  cannot  read  his  '  Synthetic 
Philosophy '  without  at  the  same  time  realizing 
that  there  are  gaps  in  his  knowledge  and  defects 
in  his  philosophical  comprehension.  We  have 
the  same  feeling  in  more  marked  degree  when 
we  read  Comte ;  and  in  his  case,  while  recog- 
nizing his  great  influence,  we  must  admit  that  it 
is  an  influence  no  longer  active.  Even  the 
eloquence  of  Mr.  Frederic  Harrison  cannot  gal- 
vanize the  '  Cours  de  Philosophic  Positive  '  into 
any  semblance  of  the  life  that  left  it  a  generation 
ago.  Nevertheless,  it  will  always  be  reckoned 
among  the  most  influential  books  of  the  century 
just  ended.  Taking  philosophy  in  the  stricter 
sense,  as  primarily  concerned  with  the  ultimate 
problems  of  thought,  the  names  of  Hegel  and 
Schopenhauer  stand  preeminent  in  the  history  of 


Literature  and  Criticism         75- 

the  nineteenth  century.  The  '  Logic '  of  the 
one  and  '  Die  Welt  als  Wille  und  Vorstellung ' 
of  the  other  have  been  the  chief  metaphysical 
forces  of  the  period,  although  now,  at  the  end  of 
the  period,  we  see  that  the  former  is  a  waning 
influence,  while  the  latter  is  an  influence  still  to 
be  taken  into  account  in  any  study  of  the  forces 
which  still  sway  the  minds  of  thoughtful  men. 
It  supplies,  better  than  any  other  metaphysical 
system  yet  produced,  the  needed  corrective  for 
that  material  view  of  the  universe  which  would 
seem  to  be  the  outcome  of  modern  science,  and 
enforces  the  fundamental  teachings  of  the  phil- 
osophers —  of  Plato,  and  Spinoza,  and  Berkeley, 
and  Kant  —  in  the  terms  of  the  modern  intellect, 
and  with  a  cogency  that  is  irresistible  to  the  logical 
mind.  We  are  inclined  to  believe  that  if  the 
'  Origin  of  Species  '  is  approached  in  its  influence 
upon  nineteenth-century  thought  by  any  other 
one  book, '  Die  Welt  als  Wille  und  Vorstellung ' 
is  that  book. 


76  Editorial  Echoes 


THE  VICTORIAN  GARDEN  OF 
SONG. 

It  is  always  difficult  to  fix  the  limits  of  a  liter- 
ary period.  Such  terms  as  the  Age  of  Pericles, 
the  Augustan  Age  (Roman  or  English),  and  the 
Elizabethan  Age  stand,  indeed,  for  fairly  definite 
concepts  ;  we  recognize  the  fact  that  a  certain 
unity  of  spirit  and  aspiration  in  the  writers  who 
made  them  famous  justifies  their  employment  as 
counters  in  the  game  of  literary  history  ;  yet 
scientific  precision  of  statement  is  obviously  out 
of  the  question  where  they  are  concerned.  We 
are  reminded,  somehow,  of  the  decorative  swirl 
wherewith,  in  Mr.  Vedder's  designs  for  the 
quatrains  of  Omar,  we  find  symbolized  the  con- 
vergence of  all  the  forces  and  influences  that 
meet  in  the  hour  of  our  conscious  existence,  only 
to  diverge  once  more  from  that  focus,  that  they 
may  enter  into  other  and  we  know  not  what 
combinations.  Thus  it  is  with  the  Victorian 
Age  in  our  literature  :  we  know  that  it  has  been 


Literature  and  Criticism         77 

the  outcome  of  the  past  ;  we  know,  likewise, 
that  its  scattered  elements  will  enter  into  the 
spiritual  synthesis  of  the  future ;  but  to  us,  whose 
lives  have  been  shaped  by  its  ideals,  the  immediate 
fact  of  its  nearness  to  us  is  all-important,  and 
the  impulse  to  regard  it  as  a  concrete  is  well-nigh 
irresistible. 

When  Mr.  Stedman  published  his  ^  Victorian 
Poets,'  in  1875,  he  brought  abundant  and  con- 
vincing logic  to  the  support  of  the  faith  that  was 
in  us  of  the  belief  that  we  were  nearing  the  close 
of  a  literary  epoch  as  well-marked  and  as  dis- 
tinctly characterized  as  any  that  had  preceded  it 
in  our  history.  The  publication,  twenty  years 
later,  of  a  ^  Victorian  Anthology,'  prepared  by 
the  same  skilful  hand,  confirmed  the  earlier  im- 
pression, and  left  us  with  a  deepened  sense  of 
the  richness  in  poetical  material  and  inspiration 
of  the  period  in  which  our  fortunate  lot  has  been 
cast.  That  the  end  has  been  now  reached  is  by 
no  means  certain,  and  the  transition  to  the  poetry 
of  the  new  age  will,  no  doubt,  be  made  easy  by 
many  connecting  links  of  melodious  utterance, 
just  as  the  poetry  of  Wordsworth  and  Landor 
did  much  to  save  from  abruptness  the  passage 


78  Editorial  Echoes 

from  the  glorious  period  of  Shelley,  Keats,  and 
Coleridge,  to  the  no  less  glorious  period  of  Ten- 
nyson, Browning,  and  Mr.  Swinburne.  Yet  the 
signs  of  a  closing  epoch  were,  on  the  whole, 
clearer  in  1895  than  they  were  twenty  years 
earlier,  and  Mr.  Stedman's  prognostication  had 
not  been  flouted  by  the  emergence  of  any  new 
and  distinctive  poetical  force.  It  was  made  at 
a  time  when  six  great  poets  of  English  speech 
wore  the  laurel  upon  living  brows ;  since  it  was 
made,  five  of  the  six  have  gone  ^  where  Orpheus 
and  where  Homer  are,'  and  no  new  altar-fires 
have  sprung  up  to  dim  the  light  of  the  single 
singer  who  still  happily  remains  with  us.  It  is 
quite  certain  that  no  twentieth  century  compiler 
of  a  Victorian  anthology  will  be  likely  much  to 
exceed  the  scope  of  Mr.  Stedman's  collection. 
The  octogenarian  of  to-day  whose  years  have 
run  parallel  with  those  of  England's  Queen,  and 
who  has  been  all  his  life  a  lover  of  poetry,  has 
had  many  things  for  which  to  be  thankful,  many 
sensations  of  the  rarer  and  more  exquisite  sort. 
To  such  a  person,  coming  to  manhood,  let  us 
say,  in  the  very  year  of  the  Queen's  accession, 
the  deaths  of  Shelley  and  Keats  were  but  childish 


Literature  and  Criticism         79 

memories,  while  the  deaths  of  Scott  and  Cole- 
ridge doubtless  seemed  to  ring  the  knell  of  creative 
poetry.  Yet  he  may  have  been  old  enough  to 
be  captivated  by  the  first  poems  of  Tennyson, 
and  to  detect  in  them  the  new  note  w^hich  even 
then  set  the  key  in  which  the  swelling  harmonies 
of  the  coming  age  were  destined  to  be  scored. 
Possibly,  also,  he  may  have  strayed,  at  the 
verge  of  manhood,  upon  '  Pauline  'and  'Paracel- 
sus,' and  wondered  at  their  strange  cadences  and 
virile  strength.  His  first  genuine  sensation,  how- 
ever, must  have  been  delayed  until  1842,  when 
the  possibilities  of  Tennyson's  genius  were  first 
fully  revealed.  The  middle  of  the  century  found 
our  lover  of  song  in  possession  of  '  The  Princess ' 
and  '  In  Memoriam,'  and  of  a  series  of  Browning 
volumes  numerous  and  distinctive  enough  to  put 
beyond  question  the  fact  that  this  poet  also  must 
be  reckoned  with.  If,  moreover,  he  had  lent  an 
attentive  ear  to  the  new  voices  about  him,  he 
could  not  have  failed  to  be  impressed  by  the 
quality  of  a  thin  volume,  published  in  1848, 
and  entitled  '  The  Strayed  Reveller  and  Other 
Poems.'  At  least,  the  appearance  of  Empedocles 
on  Etna  and  Other  Poems,'  in  1853,  "^"st  have 


8o  Editorial  Echoes 

made  It  clear  that  a  third  great  poet  had  arisen  in 
Victorian  England.  The  year  1855,  when  the 
subject  of  our  imaginary  biography  was  about 
forty  years  old,  must  still  be  remembered  by  him 
as  an  annus  mirahilis^  for  it  brought  the  '  Poems  ' 
of  Arnold,  Tennyson's  '  Maud,'  and  the  '  Men 
and  Women '  of  Browning. 

Some  ten  years  were  to  elapse  before  another 
sensation  of  the  first  class  was  possible.  The 
first  series  of  Mr.  Swinburne's  '  Poems  and  Bal- 
lads '  appeared  in  1866,  and  even  our  hypothet- 
ical octogenarian,  who  then  had  a  half  century  to 
his  credit,  would  probably  subscribe  to  the  opinion 
of  Mr.  Saintsbury  (a  much  younger  man),  when 
he  says  :  '  I  do  not  suppose  that  anybody  now 
alive  (I  speak  of  lovers  of  poetry)  who  was  not 
alive  in  1832  and  old  enough  then  to  enjoy  the 
first  perfect  work  of  Tennyson,  has  had  such  a 
sensation  as  that  which  was  experienced  in  the 
autumn  of  1866  by  readers  of  Mr.  Swinburne's 
"  Poems  and  Ballads."  And  I  am  sure  that  no 
one  in  England  has  had  any  such  sensation  since.' 
Our  reader  may,  however,  have  been  in  a  meas- 
ure prepared  for  the  experience  by  getting  hold 
of  the  ^Atalanta'  in  1864,  of  the  '  Chastelard ' 


Literature  and  Criticism         8i 

in  1865,  and  even  of  The  Queen  Mother'  and 
''Rosamond'  in  186 1.  He  may  also  have  recog- 
nized the  possibilities  of  still  another  poet,  who 
put  forth  '  The  Defence  of  Guenevere  '  as  early 
as  1858.  At  all  events,  he  can  have  had  no 
doubt  of  the  appearance  of  a  fifth  great  Victorian 
poet  when  the  year  1867  brought  '  The  Life  and 
Death  of  Jason,'  and  the  following  year  the  be- 
ginnings of  '  The  Earthly  Paradise.'  England 
might  now  proudly  boast  of  five  great  poets 
among  the  living  ;  would  there  be  a  sixth  ?  The 
question  was  soon  answered.  It  was  in  1870 
that  the  friends  of  Rossetti  persuaded  him  to  ex- 
hume the  manuscript  collection  of  verse  that  had, 
in  a  passion  of  unassuageable  grief,  been  consigned 
to  the  grave  with  the  body  of  his  wife,  and  to 
give  it  to  the  world.  The  publication  of  this 
volume  gave  to  our  lover  of  poetry  the  last  dis- 
tinctive sensation  that  he  was  to  know.  The 
period  that  has  elapsed  since  1870  has  brought 
him  no  experience  comparable  with  this,  and  his 
pleasures  have  been  limited  to  the  retrospective 
enjoyment  of  a  rich  past,  and  delight  in  the  later 
productions  of  the  six  great  poets  whose  fame  was 
so  long  ago  so  surely  established. 

6 


82  Editorial  Echoes 

Mr.  Stedman's  *■  Victorian  Anthology  '  fills 
six  hundred  and  seventy-six  compact  double- 
columned  pages,  eighty-seven  of  which  are  de- 
voted to  the  six  Victorian  master-singers.  No 
other  poets  are  illustrated  at  similar  length,  with 
the  exception  of  Landor,  who  stands  in  the  fore- 
front of  the  epoch,  and,  more  than  any  other 
poet,  serves  to  link  it  with  the  age  of  Shelley. 
Examples  are  given  us  of  no  less  than  three 
hundred  and  forty-three  poets,  thirty-six  of  whom 
belong  to  Australasia  and  Canada.  The  three 
hundred  and  seven  English  (as  distinguished 
from  Colonial)  poets  are  grouped  in  three  great 
divisions,  corresponding  to  the  beginning,  the 
middle,  and  the  close  of  the  reign.  In  each  of 
these  divisions,  subdivisions  are  formed,  and  the 
fine  critical  sense  of  the  editor  is  displayed  in  the 
felicitous  names  that  he  has  given  to  these  lesser 
groups.  Nothing  could  be  happier,  for  example, 
than  to  classify  Barham,  Maginn,  and  Mahony 
as  '  The  Roisterers  ';  Barnes,  Waugh,  and  Lay- 
cock  under  the  style  of  'The  Oaten  Flute,'  or 
Locker-Lampson,  Calverley,  and  Sir  Frederick 
Pollock  as  writers  of  '  Elegantiae.'  This  care- 
fully-considered classification  is  in  itself  a  great 


Literature  and  Criticism         83 

help  to  the  student,  and  often  suggests  affinities 
that  would  otherwise  be  likely  to  escape  his 
notice.  Nothing  is  lacking  to  make  this  great 
anthology  all  that  could  be  desired.  Besides  the 
features  of  the  work  that  have  already  been  men- 
tioned, there  is  such  an  introductory  essay  as 
Mr.  Stedman  alone  could  write,  a  section  de- 
voted to  biographical  notes,  and  indexes  of  first 
lines,  titles,  and  poets.  By  way  of  adornment, 
to  say  nothing  of  such  unfailingly  tasteful  me- 
chanical features  as  we  have  learned  to  expect 
from  the  publishers  of  this  work,  the  book  has 
two  appropriate  illustrations  in  photogravure  — 
the  '  Poets'  Corner '  in  the  Abbey,  where  so 
many  of  England's  poets  lie  buried,  and  the 
Queen,  whose  name  will  always  be  as  firmly 
associated  with  that  of  Tennyson  as  the  name 
of  Elizabeth  is  associated  with  that  of  Shake- 
speare. No  less  noticeable  than  the  fine  critical 
taste  displayed  by  Mr.  Stedman  in  making  his 
selections  is  the  conscientiousness  which  has 
gone  into  every  detail  of  his  work.  It  would  be 
difficult  to  imagine  a  better-made  anthology,  or 
one  more  likely  to  take  a  permanent  place  among 
standard  works  of  reference.     It  belongs  to  the 


84  Editorial  Echoes 

small  class  which  includes  Mr.  Humphry 
Ward's  'English  Poets'  and  Professor  Palgrave's 
'  Golden  Treasury,'  and  hardly  any  other  col- 
lections of  English  verse.  We  may  well  be 
proud  as  a  nation  that  such  a  work  for  English 
poetry  should  have  been  left  for  an  American  to 
perform. 


Literature  and  Criticism        85 


THE   CREATIVE    PERIOD   OF 
AMERICAN   VERSE. 

Five  years  after  the  publication  of  his  '  Victorian 
Anthology,'  in  the  very  year  which  closed  the 
account,  for  good  or  evil,  of  the  nineteenth  cen- 
tury, Mr.  Stedman,  with  the  '  American  Anthol- 
ogy,' crowned  his  quarter-century's  work  for  the 
appreciation  and  illustration  of  the  English  poetry 
of  our  modern  age.  In  the  performance  of  that 
work,  criticism  and  selection  have  gone  hand  in 
hand,  and  the  insight  which  has  produced  the 
best  systematic  valuations  of  our  nineteenth  cen- 
tury verse  has  also  provided  us  with  what  are 
incomparably  the  best  treasuries  into  which  the 
finer  efflorescence  of  that  verse  have  been  col- 
lected. We  owe  Mr.  Stedman  a  debt  of  deep 
gratitude  for  his  loyal  devotion  to  the  interests  of 
the  poetry  of  our  own  time,  and  for  the  pains- 
taking industry  which,  having  previously  supple- 
mented the  '  Victorian  Poets  '  with  a  '  Victorian 
Anthology,'  has  in  like  fashion  supplemented  the 


86  Editorial  Echoes 

*  Poets  of  America '  with  the  '  American  An- 
thology,' which  we  may  now  take  in  our  hands. 
In  this  portly  volume  of  close  upon  a  thousand 
pages  we  have  a  representation  of  the  poetical 
activity  of  the  national  period  of  our  history, 
beginning  with  the  lyrics  of  Freneau,  and  ending 
with  the  work  of  certain  of  our  younger  men  — 
graduates  of  the  last  few  years  —  for  whom  a 
single  line  constitutes  the  appended  biographical 
note.  By  actual  count,  the  number  of  writers 
whose  work  receives  illustration  is  five  hundred 
and  seventy-one,  of  all  degrees  of  majority  and 
minority.  No  anthologist  can  hope  to  satisfy 
all  his  critics,  and  in  the  present  case  some 
fifty  or  a  hundred  additional  names  might  easily 
be  suggested  —  by  others  than  those  who  bear 
them  —  as  worthy  of  inclusion;  but  this  easy 
sort  of  fault-finding  is  no  part  of  our  purpose, 
and  we  are  quite  sure  that  no  other  hand  could 
have  performed  Mr.  Stedman's  task  with  equal 
skill,  sympathy,  and  nice  discernment,  that  no 
other  mind  could  have  been  found  so  richly  stored 
with  the  knowledge  of  the  subject  requisite  for 
the  making  of  such  a  collection.  If  some  small 
proportion  of  the  contents  seem  undeserving  of 


Literature  and  Criticism         87 

the  distinction  here  conferred,  we  shall  do  well 
to  take  heed  of  the  editorial  hint  that  ^  humble 
bits,  low  in  color,  have  values  of  juxtaposition, 
and  often  bring  out  to  full  advantage  his  more 
striking  material.'  And  the  editor  forestalls 
critics  of  the  carping  type  by  himself  quoting 
Nathaniel  Ward's  couplet  —  which  might  else 
be  quoted  against  him  —  to  the  effect  that 
*  Poetry  's  a  gift  wherein  but  few  excel, 
He  doth  very  ill  that  doth  not  passing  well.* 

After  much  hesitation  and  tentative  experi- 
ment, Mr.  Stedman  determined  upon  a  chrono- 
logical rather  than  a  classified  arrangement  for 
the  present  volume.  The  Victorian  poets  '  crys- 
tallize into  groups,  each  animated  by  a  master, 
or  made  distinct  by  the  fraternization  of  poets 
with  tastes  in  common.'  The  poets  of  America, 
on  the  other  hand,  do  not  lend  themselves  to 
such  a  system  of  grouping,  except  in  a  few  cases. 
There  Is,  no  doubt,  a  certain  unity  in  the  methods 
and  the  endeavor  of  the  academic  group  that  we 
associate  with  the  Cambridge  and  Concord  and 
Boston  of  a  generation  ago,  and  something  of 
the  same  sort  may  be  claimed  for  the  poets  of 
the  journalistic  and  semi-Bohemian  group  that 


88  Editorial  Echoes 

we  associate  with  the  New  York  of  the  corre- 
sponding period.  But  in  the  main,  our  poets 
have  been  characterized  by  individualism,  by 
results  that  must  doubtless  be  described  as  deriv- 
ative, but  that  derive  from  the  general  English 
tradition  rather  than  from  any  strongly-marked 
interactions  and  obligations  to  special  leadership. 
The  only  satisfactory  order  of  arrangement  thus 
appeared  to  be  that  of  sequence  in  time. 

Mr.  Stedman  finds  it  convenient  to  divide  our 
first  poetical  century  into  eight  sections.  The 
first  of  them  has  something  of  the  character  of  a 
prologue,  and  includes  such  names  as  Freneau, 
Paulding,  Allston,  Wilde,  and  Dana.  Then  fol- 
low three  divisions,  of  about  fifteen  years  each, 
constituting  what  is  called  the  '  First  Lyrical 
Period.'  In  the  first  of  these  divisions  we  find 
Halleck,  Drake,  Bryant,  Sprague,  Percival,  and 
Pinckney.  In  the  second  we  find  Emerson, 
Willis,  Hoffman,  Longfellow,  Whittier,  Poe, 
and  Holmes,  In  the  third  we  find  Lowell,  Whit- 
man, Parsons,  Boker,  Taylor,  and  Stoddard. 
Then  follows  the  '  Second  Lyrical  Period,'  also 
in  three  divisions,  each  of  about  ten  years.  In 
the   first   we  find   Dr.   Mitchell,   Hayne,  Mrs. 


Literature  and  Criticism         89 

Jackson,  Mr.  Stedman,  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Piatt,  Mrs. 
Moulton,  Mr.  Winter,  Mr.  Aldrich,  Mr.  Harte, 
Sill,  Mr.  Miller,  and  Lanier.  In  the  second  we 
find  Mr.  Gilder,  Miss  Thomas,  Miss  Lazarus, 
Mr.  Van  Dyke,  and  Mr.  R.  U.  Johnson.  In 
the  third  we  find  Mr.  Woodberry,  Bunner,  Mrs. 
Deland,  Miss  Cone,  and  Miss  Guiney.  Finally, 
we  have  a  section  that  forms  a  sort  of  epilogue, 
and  includes  many  names  of  our  most  recent 
writers,  among  them  being  Mr.  Robert  Cameron 
Rogers,  Miss  Sophie  Jewett,  Richard  Hovey, 
Mr.  Cawein,  Miss  Aldrich,  Mr.  E.  A.  Robinson, 
Miss  Josephine  Peabody,  and  Miss  Helen  Hay. 
It  is  evident  enough  that  the  poetical  showing 
of  our  first  century  has  little  significance  from 
the  cosmopolitan  point  of  view,  although,  as  we 
shall  urge  a  little  further  on,  it  has  much  signifi- 
cance for  us  as  a  nation.  Let  us  see  how  it  com- 
pares with  the  showing  of  the  mother-country. 
The  twelve  greatest  English  poets  of  the  same 
period  are  Keats,  Shelley,  Byron,  Wordsworth, 
Coleridge,  Landor,  Tennyson,  Browning,  Arnold, 
Rossetti,  Morris,  and  Mr.  Swinburne.  The  best 
dozen  of  our  American  poets  are  probably  Bryant, 
Emerson,   Holmes,    Longfellow,   Lowell,   Poe, 


90  Editorial  Echoes 

Whitman,  Whittier,  Lanier,  Taylor,  Mr.  Aid- 
rich,  and  Mr.  Stedman.  There  is  obviously  little 
room  for  comparison  between  the  two  groups. 
From  the  standpoint  of  disinterested  criticism  it 
is  hardly  too  much  to  say  that  in  absolute  value 
the  English  group  immensely  outweighs  the 
American.  It  would  require  an  excess  of  patri- 
otic zeal  to  dispute  a  conclusion  so  obvious  to  the 
impartial  observer.  But  without  blinking  this 
fact,  we  have  no  need  to  hide  our  diminished 
heads,  for  the  poets  of  America  have  done  for  us 
a  work  which  the  poets  of  the  mother-country, 
Shakespeare  and  all,  could  not  have  done  for  us  : 
they  have  kept  the  torch  of  our  national  idealism 
aflame,  and  have  touched  our  national  spirit  to 
issues  as  fine  as  any  that  have  engaged  the  con- 
sciousness of  the  peoples  of  the  Old  World.  To 
do  these  things  is  the  true  service  of  poetry,  and, 
knowing  how  well  our  own  poets  have  done  them 
for  us,  we  may  take  a  just  pride  in  their  achieve- 
ments, caring  little  for  comparisons  which,  in  a 
case  like  this,  must  be  peculiarly  invidious. 

When  Mr.  Stedman  reached  the  conclusion 
that  '  if  a  native  anthology  must  yield  to  the  for- 
eign one  in  wealth  of  choice  production,  it  might 


Literature  and  Criticism        91 

prove  to  be,  from  an  equally  vital  point  of  view, 
the  more  significant  of  the  two/  he  occupied 
ground  that  was  less  paradoxical  than  it  seemed. 
The  significance  of  a  corpus  of  national  song 
rests  not  so  much  upon  its  absolute  artistic  value 
as  upon  its  power  to  mould  the  ideals  of  a 
people  by  giving  expression  to  those  higher  in- 
stincts that  are  always  groping  toward  the  light, 
but  that  may  fail  of  their  purpose  when  the  light 
is  obscured.  This  Republic  was  founded  upon 
an  idealism  finer  than  any  hitherto  known  in  the 
modern  world,  and  it  is  to  our  poets,  far  more 
than  to  our  so-called  practical  men,  that  we  owe 
the  perpetuation  of  that  idealism  in  our  hearts. 
It  is  their  teaching  that  has  inspired  us  to  hope 
in  our  darkest  hour ;  it  is  a  belief  in  the  potency 
of  their  messages  that  still  rebukes  our  wavering 
faith  in  so  momentous^a  crisis  of  our  national  life 
as  that  which  we  confront  in  these  opening  years 
of  the  century. 

We  may  well  ask,  with  the  editor  of  the  present 
collection,  what  constitutes  the  real  significance 
of  the  poetry  of  any  nation.  Is  it  *  the  essential 
quality  of  its  material  as  poetry,'  or  is  it  'its 
quality  as  an  expression  and  interpretation  of  the 


92  Editorial  Echoes 

time  itself"?    Mr.  Stedman  declares  for  the  latter 

of  these  alternatives,  and  urges  that  view  with 

much  logical  force. 

<  Our  own  poetry  excels  as  a  recognizable  voice  In 
utterance  of  the  emotions  of  a  people.  The  storm  and 
stress  of  youth  have  been  upon  us,  and  the  nation  has 
not  lacked  its  lyric  cry;  meanwhile  the  typical  senti- 
ments of  piety,  domesticity,  freedom,  have  made  our 
less  impassioned  verse  at  least  sincere.  One  who  under- 
rates the  significance  of  our  literature,  prose  or  verse,  as 
both  the  expression  and  the  stimulant  of  national  feeling, 
as  of  import  In  the  past  and  to  the  future  of  America, 
and  therefore  of  the  world,  is  deficient  in  that  critical 
insight  which  can  judge  even  of  Its  own  day  unwarped 
by  personal  taste  or  deference  to  public  impression.  He 
shuts  his  eyes  to  the  fact  that  at  times,  notably  through- 
out the  years  resulting  in  the  Civil  War,  this  literature 
has  been  a  **  force. '^  Its  verse  until  the  dominance  of 
prose  fiction  —  well  into  the  seventies,  let  us  say  — 
formed  the  staple  of  current  reading;  and  fortunate  it 
was  —  while  pirated  foreign  writings,  sold  cheaply  every- 
where, handicapped  the  evolution  of  a  native  prose  school 
—  that  the  books  of  the  <*  elder  American  poets  ''  lay  on 
the  centre-tables  of  our  households,  and  were  read  with 
zest  by  young  and  old.' 

If  our  poets  have  not  been  great  poets  in  the 
world  sense,  they  have  accomplished  great  things 
for  our  spiritual  life,  and  our  feeling  toward  them 
is  of  gratitude  and  reverence  commingled.    They 


Literature  and  Criticism         93 

have  twined  themselves  about  our  affections  as 
no  others  could  have  done,  and  have  become 
associated  with  our  fondest  recollections  and  our 
deepest  aspirations.  And  our  love  is  bestowed 
not  only  upon  our  Whittier  and  our  Holmes,  our 
Emerson  and  our  Lowell,  but  also  upon  those 
of  our  lesser  singers  who  have  touched  some 
intimate  chord  of  our  consciousness  and  awakened 
the  responsive  thrill.  Here  in  this  volume  are 
five  or  six  hundred  names,  and  who  shall  assert 
that  the  least  of  those  who  bear  them  has  not 
contributed  something  of  value  to  the  general 
store,  has  not  proved  himself  worthy  of  his  race 
and  helpful  of  its  spiritual  advancement  ?  What 
their  collective  endeavor  has  meant  to  us  as  a 
nation  is  beyond  the  power  of  words  to  testify. 
But  it  is  at  least  suggested  by  the  felicitous  lines 
in  which  Mr.  Stedman  himself  describes  his 
vision  of  '  the  constellated  matin  choir '  that 
'  sang  together  in  the  dawn,'  and  tells  us  how  he 

*  Heard  their  stately  hymning,  saw  their  light 
Resolve  in  flame  that  evil  long  inwrought 
With  what  was  else  the  goodliest  domain 
Of  freedom  warded  by  the  ancient  sea.' 

Those  to  whom  the  sweep  of  that  vision  has  been 


94  Editorial  Echoes 

revealed  can  have  no  misgivings  concerning  the 
true  worth  of  American  poetry,  for  their  feelings 
are  merged  in  the  one  emotion  of  swelling  pride 
at  thought  of  their  share  in  so  noble  a  national 
inheritance. 


Literature  and  Criticism         95 


THE  FORMULA  OF  AMERICAN 
LITERATURE. 

We  recently  had-  occasion  to  discuss,  in  the  light 
of  Mr.  Stedman's  '  American  Anthology,'  the 
single  century  of  literary  activity  that  has  pro- 
duced practically  all  the  poetry  that  we  cherish 
as  our  American  national  possession.  It  is  to 
the  larger  subject  of  our  entire  literature,  now 
that  three  full  centuries  of  its  course  have  been 
rounded,  that  attention  is  directed  by  the  present 
discussion,  for  which  occasion  has  been  furnished 
by  the  appearance  of  Professor  Barrett  Wendell's 
^  Literary  History  of  America.'  The  plan  of  the 
series  of  literary  histories  for  which  this  work 
has  been  written,  and  of  which  it  is  much  the 
most  important  volume  thus  far  published,  calls 
for  far  more  than  a  collection  of  biographies, 
bibliographical  annals,  and  critical  commentaries. 
It  calls,  indeed,  for  a  history  no  less  faithful  to 
the  service  of  Clio  than  the  histories  whose  titles 
are  modified  by  no  qualifying  adjective  j  but  it 


g6  Editorial  Echoes 

calls  at  the  same  time  for  a  shifting  of  the  point 
of  view  that  will  bring  literature,  rather  than 
politics  or  strategics,  into  the  foreground.  Such 
a  treatment  of  English  history  has  been  attempted 
by  the  distinguished  French  scholar,  M.  Jusse- 
rand ;  such  a  treatment  of  American  history  is 
now  given  us  by  Professor  Wendell.  It  is  only 
when  discussed  from  this  standpoint  that  Ameri- 
can literature  is  given  its  full  significance,  for  its 
absolute  aesthetic  value  is  not  great,  relatively 
speaking,  while  no  value  could  well  be  greater 
than  that  which  it  has  for  the  interpretation  of 
the  national  development,  or  for  the  appeal  which 
it  makes  to  the  national  consciousness. 

'  The  literary  history  of  America,'  says  the 
author,  '  is  the  story,  under  new  conditions,  of 
those  ideals  which  a  common  language  has  com- 
pelled America,  almost  unawares,  to  share  with 
England.  Elusive  though  they  be,  ideals  are  the 
souls  of  the  nations  which  cherish  them,  —  the 
living  spirits  which  waken  nationality  into  being, 
and  which  often  preserve  its  memory  long  after 
its  life  has  ebbed  away.  Denied  by  the  impa- 
tience which  will  not  seek  them  where  they 
smoulder  beneath  the  cinders  of  cant,  derided  by 


Literature  and  Criticism        97 

the  near-sighted  wisdom  which  is  content  with 
the  world-old  commonplaceof  how  practice  must 
always  swerve  from  precept,  they  mysteriously, 
resurgently  persist.'  The  possession  of  certain 
ideals  in  common  with  the  island  race  from  which 
we  have  sprung  may  be  taken  as  the  guiding 
principle  of  the  writer's  treatment  of  American 
literature.  In  assuming  this  basic  proposition  he 
plants  himself  upon  solid  ground,  upon  ground 
far  more  solid  than  that  of  the  critic  who  is  ever 
on  the  lookout  for  differentia  instead  of  devoting 
his  efforts  to  making  clear  the  underlying  unity 
of  all  the  literature  written  in  the  English  lan- 
guage. Nationality  is  far  more  a  matter  of 
language  than  of  race  or  descent,  and  'these 
languages  which  we  speak  grow  more  deeply 
than  anything  else  to  be  a  part  of  our  mental 
habit  who  use  them.'  To  take  a  single  illus- 
tration of  this  principle,  there  was  never  uttered 
a  philosophical  truth  more  profound  than  that 
embodied  in  Wordsworth's  familiar  lines, 

*  We  must  be  free  or  die  who  speak  the  tongue 
That  Shakespeare  spake,  the  faith  and  morals  hold 
Which  Milton  held.' 

That  is  the  real  secret  of  English  democracy, 

7 


98  Editorial  Echoes 

and  it  also  offers  for  the  explanation  of  American 
democracy  a  cause  far  more  adequate  than  any 
superficial  attempt  to  account  for  it  as  resulting 
from  foreign  influence. 

It  is  a  part  of  the  critic's  business,  no  doubt, 
to  detect  differentice  between  the  varieties  of 
English  expression  in  various  lands,  and  they  are 
not  lacking  between  the  literatures  of  England 
and  America.  Each  country  has  its  own  land- 
scapes, its  own  trees  and  flowers  and  birds,  its 
own  historical  traditions,  and  a  civilization 
moulded  by  its  own  form  and  pressure.  But  it 
is  a  mistake  to  exalt  these  minor  divergences  into 
generic  distinctions,  for  they  are  much  less  than 
that,  and  serve  chiefly  to  bring  into  clearer  view 
the  ideal  community  of  the  two  bodies  of  litera- 
ture, doing  this  by  the  very  contrast  between 
their  unimportance  and  the  importance  of  the 
deep  spiritual  traits  upon  which  all  these  diff^er- 
ences  are  the  merest  surface  variations.  We 
may  possibly  allow  the  additional  drop  of  nervous 
fluid  which  Colonel  Higginson  claims  for  the 
American,  but  beyond  this  we  may  hardly  go  and 
remain  philosophical  of  mind. 

We  have  never  seen  a  better  statement  than 


Literature  and  Criticism         99 

is  now  given  us  by  Professor  Wendell  of  the 
indissoluble  unity  of  English  and  American  lit- 
erary expression.  '  The  ideals  which  for  three 
hundred  years  America  and  England  have  cher- 
ished, alike  yet  apart,  are  ideals  of  morality  and 
of  government  —  of  right  and  of  rights.  Who- 
ever has  lived  his  conscious  life  in  the  terms  of 
our  language,  so  saturated  with  the  temper  and 
the  phrases  both  of  the  English  Bible  and  of 
English  Law,  has  perforce  learned  that,  however 
he  may  stray,  he  cannot  escape  the  duty  which 
bids  us  do  right  and  maintain  our  rights.  Gen- 
eral as  these  phrases  must  seem,  —  common  at 
first  glance  to  the  serious  moments  of  all  men 
everywhere,  —  they  have,  for  us  of  English- 
speaking  race,  a  meaning  peculiarly  our  own. 
Though  Englishmen  have  prated  enough  and  to 
spare,  and  though  Americans  have  declaimed 
about  human  rights  more  nebulously  still,  the 
rights  for  which  Englishmen  and  Americans  alike 
have  been  eager  to  fight  and  to  die,  are  no  pris- 
matic fancies  gleaming  through  clouds  of  con- 
flicting logic  and  metaphor ;  they  are  that  living 
body  of  customs  and  duties  and  privileges  which 
a  process  very  like  physical  growth  has  made  the 


100  Editorial  Echoes 

vital  condition  of  our  national  existence.  Through 
immemorial  experience,  the  rights  which  we 
most  jealously  cherish  have  proved  themselves 
safely  favorable  at  oncfe  to  prosperity  and  to 
righteousness.'  It  is  this  twofold  idealism,  of 
right  and  of  rights,  that  has  made  English  liter- 
ature everywhere  essentially  the  same,  and  a  real- 
ization of  this  truth  should  rebuke  the  sectional 
pride  which  seeks  to  make  barriers  out  of  trifles, 
and  find  radical  divergences  in  the  surface-play 
of  expression.  It  is  in  this  spirit  that  Professor 
Wendell  has  dealt  with  the  three  completed 
centuries  of  American  literature,  not  minimizing 
the  individual  peculiarities  of  writers  or  the 
special  characteristics  of  groups,  nor  failing  to 
recognize  Americanism  as  a  trait  where  it  really 
exists,  but  keeping  ever  in  mind  the  correlations 
of  English  and  American  history,  and  the  funda- 
mental unity  of  the  two  peoples  as  expressed  in 
their  institutions,  their  laws,  their  social  and 
ethical  outlook. 

The  chief  distinction  to  be  drawn  between 
English  and  American  literature  is  concerned, 
not  with  any  fundamental  diiFerence  of  temper, 
but  with  a  difference  in  the  rate  of  development. 


Literature  and  Criticism       loi 

No  one  can  glance  over  the  selections  made 
for  the  seventeenth  and  eighteenth  centuries  in 
such  a  work  as  Duyckinck,  or  in  the  later 
*  Library  '  of  Mr.  Stedman,  without  being  im- 
pressed by  the  fact  that  the  American  literary 
manner  was  at  all  times  a  generation,  if  not  a 
century,  behind  the  English.  This  fact  has  many 
times  been  noted,  but  it  has  remained  for  the 
author  of  the  work  now  under  consideration  to 
place  due  emphasis  upon  it,  and  to  give  it  the 
prominence  it  demands  in  a  survey  of  early 
American  literature.  To  begin  with,  he  notes 
the  fact  that  all  of  the  famous  first  settlers  of 
Plymouth  and  Massachusetts  Bay  —  Bradford, 
Winthrop,  Cotton,  Hooker,  Richard  Mather, 
Roger  Williams,  and  the  rest  —  were  born  Eliza- 
bethans, although  not  '  quite  the  kind  of  Eliza- 
bethans who  expressed  themselves  in  poetry.' 
Now  the  characteristics  of  the  Elizabethan  spirit 
were  these  —  ^  spontaneity,  enthusiasm,  and  ver- 
satility,' and  if  we  look  aright  we  shall  discover 
that  such  were  also  the  characteristics  of  our 
own  writers  of  the  seventeenth  and  even  the 
eighteenth  century.  Taking  Cotton  Mather  as 
the  typical  man  of  letters  of  the  two  centuries  in 


102  Editorial  Echoes 

questi'on,  the  writer  boldly  testifies  to  the  vitality 
of  his  enthusiasm,  the  spontaneity  of  his  utterance, 
and  his  possession  of  'just  that  kind  of  restless 
versatility  which  characterized  Elizabethan  En- 
gland and  which  even  to  our  own  day  has  re- 
mained characteristic  of  New  England  Yankees/ 
The  New  England  colonies  remained  practically 
uninfluenced  by  the  social  and  political  move- 
ments of  the  mother-country,  and  '  in  history 
and  literature  alike,  the  story  of  seventeenth- 
century  America  is  a  story  of  unique  national 
inexperience.'  In  the  century  following,  came 
the  preaching  of  Whitefield  and  the  Great 
Awakening,  and  when  the  Revolution  was  ripe 
it  '  once  more  brought  to  the  surface  of  Amer- 
ican life  the  sort  of  natures  whom  the  Great 
Awakening  shows  so  fully  to  have  preserved  the 
spontaneity  and  the  enthusiasm  of  earlier  days.' 
The  conclusion  of  all  this  argument  is  expressed 
by  saying  that  'the  Americans  of  the  Revolu- 
tionary period  retained  to  an  incalculable  degree 
qualities  which  had  faded  from  ancestral  England 
with  the  days  of  Queen  Elizabeth.' 

This  line  of  thought  may  be  pursued  down 
into  the  history  of  our  literature  during  a  con- 


Literature  and  Criticism       103 

siderable  part  of  the  century  just  ending,  and  it 
was  not  until  we  had  a  great  national  experience 
of  our  own  that  we  produced  a  body  of  literature 
not  closely  associated  with  the  earlier  types  of 
literature  in  our  ancestral  home.  Up  to  the  mid- 
century  period,  when  our  literature  first  allied 
kseif  with  a  burning  national  issue,  and  became 
more  distinctly  American  than  it  ever  could  have 
been  before,  there  continued  to  be  reversions  to 
manners  and  forms  of  expression  that  were  long 
outworn  in-  England.  Space  forbids  us  to  con- 
tinue the  subject  any  further,  but  enough  has 
been  said  to  show  how  fruitful  a  formula  has 
been  appiied^by  Professor  Wendell  to  the  analysis 
of  our  literary  past.  It  remains^  to  be  added  that 
he  has  produced  the  best  history  of  American 
literature  thus  far  written  by  anybody,  a  history 
that  is  searching  in  its  method  and  profound  in 
its  judgments,  on  the  one  hand,  and,  on  the 
other,  singularly  attractive  in  the  manner  of  its 
presentation. 


104  Editorial  Echoes 


A   CENTURY    OF   AMERICAN 
FICTION. 

The  American  novel  is  only  one  hundred  years 
old.  It  took  the  colonists  nearly  two  centu- 
ries to  free  their  imagination  from  the  physical 
and  intellectual  trammels  imposed  upon  it  by  the 
hard  necessity  of  making  a  virgin  world  into  a 
habitation  fit  for  man,  and  the  still  harder  bondage 
of  a  theocratic  conception  of  society.  As  long 
as  the  forests  remained  uncleared  and  the  Indians 
unsubdued,  and  as  long  as  men's  minds  were 
under  the  obsession  of  a  grim  theology,  there 
was  little  hope  for  creative  literature,  and  the 
writers  who  put  pen  to  paper  were  chiefly  urged 
by  a  desire  to  take  part  in  some  ephemeral  con- 
troversy of  religion  or  politics,  or,  at  the  utmost, 
by  the  hope  of  emulating  certain  favorite  examples 
of  the  mother-country's  literary  product.  Thus 
the  best  of  our  early  writings  were  imitative,  and 
imitative  our  budding  literature  remained  until  a 
time  within  the  memory  of  many  persons  now 


Literature  and  Criticism       105 

living.  But  the  publication  of  Brown's  '  Wie- 
land,'  in  1798,  at  least  marked  the  beginning  of 
the  end  of  our  long  term  of  sterility,  and  this  is 
why  it  becomes  appropriate,  a  hundred  years 
later,  to  ask  what  has  been  accomplished  for  us 
by  a  century  of  novel-writing. 

When  we  entered  upon  the  first  decade  of  the 
present  century,  we  had  nothing  to  show  in  the 
form  of  fiction  except  the  earliest  of  Brown's 
romances,  and  two  or  three  such  books  as  Susanna 
Rowson's  '  Charlotte  Temple,  a  Tale  of  Truth,' 
whose  '  pages  were  long  bedewed  with  many 
tears  of  many  readers.'  But  the  novel-reader  of 
these  days  was  not  as  insatiate  in  appetite  as  he 
has  since  become,  and  was  well  content  with 
Richardson,  and  Fielding,  and  Sterne,  and  Miss 
Burney,  if  his  taste  was  of  the  finer  sort ;  with 
Walpole,  and  '  Monk '  Lewis,  and  Ann  Rad- 
clifFe,  if  his  imagination  thirsted  for  mystery  and 
gloom.  He  was  probably  happier  with  the  few 
books  of  native  origin  that  he  did  possess  than 
our  latter-day  readers,  who  get  more  American 
fiction  than  they  can  possibly  digest,  yet  wax 
indignant  because  the  Great  American  Novel  is 
so  long  delayed,  and  declaim  upon  the  national 


io6  Editorial  Echoes 

folly  of  our  liking  all  good  books  in  the  English 
language,  even  if  they  are  written  by  our  kin 
beyond  seas,  or  translated  from  the  tongues  of 
the  stranger. 

It  may  prove  interesting  to  take  the  present 
century  by  decades,  and  see  what  each  decennial 
period  has  done  for  the  development  of  the  art 
of  novel-writing  in  the  United  States.  We  have 
seen  how  the  account  stood  in  the  beginning; 
what  had  we  to  show  for  ourselves  ten  years 
later  ?  It  is  a  question  easily  answered.  There 
were  the  rest  of  Brown's  romances,  a  few  such 
books  as  Tabitha  Tenney's  '  Female  Quixotism ' 
and  Caroline  Warren's  '  The  Gamesters,'  and  — 
of  greater  significance  than  anything  hitherto 
done  in  American  letters  —  the  book  which, 
although  not  a  novel,  was  to  prove  the  starting- 
point  of  truly  native  inspiration  in  fiction,  the 
famous  '  History  of  New  York  '  by  one  Diedrich 
Knickerbocker.  When  another  ten  years  had 
passed,  the  pioneer  work  begun  with  this  delightful 
piece  of  quasi-historical  and  humorous  fiction 
was  still  further  emphasized  by  the  publication 
of '  The  Sketch-Book.'  Of  the  stories  included 
in  this  volume  Professor  Richardson  justly  says: 


Literature  and  Criticism       107 

'  They  are  local  in  scene  and  character,  strong 
in  delineation  of  the  personages  introduced,  and 
thoroughly  artistic  in  literary  form  and  elabora- 
tion. .  .  .  When  to  novelty  in  theme  and  form 
was  added  the  easy  serenity  of  an  assured  and 
confident  literary  touch,  American  fiction  had 
clearly  passed  beyond  the  stage  of  apology  and 
curiosity.' 

The  year  1820  is  also  noteworthy  as  the  year 
-in  which  '  Precaution '  saw  the  light,  and  the 
most  important  thing  to  be  said  about  the  twen- 
ties is  that  they  witnessed  the  development  of 
Cooper's  activity  at  the  rate  of  one  new  novel  for 
almost  every  year.  It  was  evident  that  America 
had  at  last  produced  a  novelist  who  had  come  to 
stay,  and  the  acclaim  with  which  Cooper  was 
received  both  at  home  and  abroad  made  it  clear 
enough  that  the  New  World  was  ready  to  provide 
both  the  occasion  and  the  field,  and  that  men 
would  soon  be  forthcoming  to  seize  upon  the  one 
and  cultivate  the  other.  Meanwhile,  '  the  ob- 
scurest man  of  letters  in  America,'  as  Hawthorne 
once  styled  himself,  was  slowly  passing  through 
the  chrysalis  stage,  and  '  Fanshawe,'  the  first  of 
his  novels,  was  actually  written  during  the  late 


io8  Editorial  Echoes 

twenties,  although  the  public  was  to  know  noth- 
ing about  it  until  many  years  later,  when  the 
fame  of  the  author  as  the  greatest  of  American 
novelists  had  become  fully  assured. 

Besides  witnessing  the  continued  production  of 
Cooper's  novels,  the  thirties  brought  into  prom- 
inence the  name  of  Paulding,  the  friend  and  col- 
laborator of  Irving,  and  the  one  book  by  that 
writer  which  still  retains  a  precarious  hold  upon 
life,  '  The  Dutchman's  Fireside,'  bears  the  date 
of  1 83 1.  The  year  following  was  the  year  of 
'  Swallow  Barn,'  which  marked  the  beginning  of 
a  distinctively  Southern  variety  of  the  American 
novel.  Kennedy's  slender  contribution  to  our 
fiction  falls  wholly  within  this  decade,  as  does 
also  the  first  instalment  of  the  romantic  fiction 
that  was  for  thirty  years  to  flow  in  such  a  stream 
from  the  prolific  pen  of  Simms.  Nor  must  we 
forget  to  mention  the  name  of  Dr.  Bird,  if  it  be 
only  to  note  the  fact  that  the  yellow-covered 
'  dime  '  novel  of  a  .later  generation  traced  its  lin- 
eage back  to  '  Nick  of  the  Woods '  and  '  The 
Hawks  of  Hawk  Hollow.'  From  the  late  thirties 
date  also  the  popular  ^  Zenobia  '  and  '  Aurelian  ' 
of  William  Ware,  which  still  find  admirers,  we 


Literature  and  Criticism       109 

believe,  in  certain  strata  of  the  reading  public. 
When  this  decade  came  to  its  close,  the  '  Twice- 
Told  Tales,'  first  collected  three  years  before, 
had  shown  the  existence  of  a  hitherto  unexampled 
artistic  force  in  American  letters,  the  '  Hyperion ' 
of  the  year  just  preceding  had  given  our  public  a 
faint  but  charming  reflection  of  the  romantic 
movement  in  Germany,  while  Poe's  '  Tales  of 
the  Grotesque  and  Arabesque'  made  the  year 
1840  a  landmark  in  the  history  of  our  fiction. 

The  fifth  decade  was  distinguished  by  nothing 
more  noteworthy  than  Herman  Melville's  stories 
of  the  southern  seas,  which  appeared  in  rapid 
succession  during  these  years.  But  the  year  that 
stands  midway  in  the  century  is  doubly  signifi- 
cant, for  it  was  in  1850  that  Cooper's  last  novel 
saw  the  light,  and  that  *-  The  Scarlet  Letter '  — 
the  most  perfect  piece  of  creative  literature  yet 
produced  in  the  United  States  —  was  given  to 
the  world.  The  decade  of  the  fifties  was  domi- 
nated by  the  genius  of  Hawthorne,  and  brought 
forward  only  two  new  names  that  were  destined 
to  outlive  their  generation.  ^  Uncle  Tom's 
Cabin'  and  '  The  Virginia  Comedians'  must  be 
remembered  in  any  survey,  however  summary, 


no  Editorial  Echoes 

of  our  native  fiction  —  the  one  for  its  immense 
social  influejice,  the  other  for  being,  on  the  whole, 
the  best  novel  produced  by  the  South  during  the 
ante-helium  period. 

The  ten  years  that  included  the  four  of  the 
Civil  War  added  several  important  new  names 
to  the  annals  of  our  fiction,  and  are  certainly  not 
chargeable  with  sterility,  even  if  their  literary 
activity  did  not  prove  commensurate  with  the 
expansion  of  the  national  consciousness.  The 
two  famous  novels  of  Holmes,  the  promising 
tales  of  Winthrop,  the  respectable  fictions  of 
Bayard  Taylor,  Dr.  Hale's  '  Man  Without  a 
Country,'  Mr.  Aldrich's  'Story  of  a  Bad  Boy,' 
and  '  The  Innocents  Abroad '  make  up  a  fairly 
satisfactory  list,  while  the  very  last  year  of  the 
decade  was  that  in  which  '  The  Luck  of  Roaring 
Camp'  took  the  public  by  storm,  and  brought 
into  our  fiction  a  new  and  resonant  note  of  which 
the  echoes  have  not  yet  grown  faint. 

In  all  our  annals  there  is  probably  nothing 
more  significant  than  the  publication  of  this 
idyl  of  the  new  rough  West.  It  meant,  as  we 
can  see  plainly  enough  after  these  thirty  years, 
that  our  fiction  was  about  to  become  intensely 


Literature  and  Criticism       iii 

local  and  vividly  realistic.  The  fine  flower  of 
ideal  literary  art  had  blossomed  and  died  with 
Hawthorne ;  henceforth  our  novelists  were  to 
busy  themselves  with  the  interpretation  of  life 
at  close  range,  and  were  to  produce  a  kaleido- 
scopic body  of  fiction  each  bit  of  which  should 
sparkle  with  its  own  characteristic  and  indepen- 
dent color.  This  is  the  general  formula  which 
enables  us  to  include  in  one  category,  no  matter 
how  varied  the  scene  and  how  diverse  the  accent, 
the  work  of  Mr.  Harte,  Mr.  Howells,  and  Mr. 
James,  the  novels  of  Mr.  Clemens,  Mr.  Warner, 
Mr.  Cable,  and  Mr.  James  Lane  Allen,  the 
countless  sketches  and  social  studies  of  Mr. 
Eggleston,  Dr.  Mitchell,  Mr.  Page,  Colonel 
Johnston,  and  Major  Kirkland,  and  the  charm- 
ing section  of  our  Hterature  that  embraces  the 
writings  of  Miss  Murfree,  Miss  Wilkins,  Miss 
Jewett,  Miss  French,  and  Mrs.  Foote.  Com- 
pared with  this  list,  which  might  be  indefinitely 
extended  with  minor  yet  deserving  names,  the 
novelists  who  have  eschewed  realism  and  stood 
for  the  old  romantic  conventions  are  but  a  small 
company,  and  have  done  little  to  check  the  tidal 
movement  of  the  period.      An  entire  generation 


112  Editorial  Echoes 

of  novel-readers  has  found  satisfaction  in  fiction 
of  the  descriptive  and  analytical  type,  and  the 
inevitable  reaction  of  taste  sets  in  so  slowly  that, 
although  the  signs  have  been  gathering  for  sev- 
eral years,  the  changing  of  the  old  order  has 
barely  begun.  Such  is  the  history  of  American 
fiction,  from  the  '  Wieland '  of  1798  to  '  The 
Crisis,'  let  us  say,  of  a  hundred  years  later. 


Literature  and  Criticism       113 


THE  POETRY   OF   MR.   MOODY. 

Every  two  or  three  years,  from  some  quarter 
of  the  critical  horizon  there  issue  trumpetings  of 
praise  which  herald  the  advent  of  a  new  singer 
of  songs.  A  bright  star  has  swum  into  the  ken 
of  some  watcher  upon  the  battlements,  and  the 
discovery  is  proclaimed  to  the  world  with  much 
pomp  of  rhetorical  eulogy.  The  number  of  new 
poets  who  have  thus  been  discovered  during  the 
past  quarter-century  is  considerable,  but  most  of 
them  have  shared  the  fate  of  the  nova  known  to 
astronomers,  and  their  magnitude  has  rapidly 
become  dimmed.  We  have  often  envied  the 
enthusiasm  that  could  find  so  much  to  praise  in 
these  new  interpreters  of  nature  and  human  life, 
but  have  felt  ourselves  sorrowfully  compelled  to 
stand  outside  the  chorus,  and  to  mar  its  harmonies 
by  the  injection  of  certain  discordant  notes  of 
caution  and  temperate  restraint.  A  book  of 
poetry  must  exhibit  very  great  qualities  indeed 
to  constitute  an  event  in  literature,  or  to  set  its 

8 


ri4  Editorial  Echoes 

writer  among  the  enduring  poets  of  his  age.  In 
the  memory  of  men  now  in  their  middle  or  ad- 
vancing years  there  have  been  only  two  such 
events  in  English  poetry  —  the  appearance  of  Mr. 
Swinburne's  'Poems  and  Ballads'  in  1866  and 
of  the  '  Poems  '  of  Rossetti  in  1870.  Tested  by 
these  touchstones,  '  The  Love  Sonnets  of  Pro- 
teus,' and  'The  City  of  Dreadful  Night,'  the 
books  of  Mr.  Watson  and  Mr.  Kipling  and 
Mr.  Phillips  have  been  phenomena  of  only  sec- 
ondary significance.  Yet  the  writers  of  all  these 
books,  and  other  writers  as  well,  have  been  hailed 
as  new  luminaries  of  the  first  rank,  have  been 
praised  in  terms  that  one  would  hesitate  to  apply 
to  Arnold  or  Tennyson,  and  have  been  made, 
as  far  as  indiscriminate  eulogy  could  make  them, 
the  literary  fashion  of  their  respective  hours. 
Praiseworthy  they  doubtless  are,  but  not  worthy 
of  the  sort  of  praise  that  has  been  injudiciously 
bestowed  upon  them  to  the  confusion  of  all  ab- 
solute values. 

In  making  the  following  somewhat  extended 
comment  upon  the  poetical  work  of  Mr.  William 
Vaughn  Moody,  we  are  not  going  to  say  that  he 
is  a  poet  of  the  highest  kind  of  accomplishment, 


Literature  and  Criticism       115 

or  apply  to  him  the  language  that  must  properly 
be  reserved  for  poets  whose  work  has  stood  the 
test  of  time  and  remained  uncorroded  by  it.  But 
we  are  going  to  say  —  and  by  our  exhibits  seek 
to  prove  —  that  no  other  new  poet  of  the  past 
score  of  years,  either  in  America  or  in  England, 
has  displayed  a  finer  promise  upon  the  occasion 
of  his  first  appearance,  or  has  been  deserving  of 
more  respectful  consideration.  There  is  no  rea- 
son, for  example,  why  his  work  should  attract 
kss  attention  than  has  been  given  o-f  late  to  the 
work  of  Mr.  Stephen  Phillips,  and  we  make  not 
the  slightest  doubt  that,  had  his  work  been  the 
product  of  an  Englishman,  its  author  would  have 
been  accorded  the  resounding  praise  that  has  been 
accorded  to  the  author  of '  Marpessa '  and  '  Paolo 
and  Francesca.'  We  wish  to  say,  furthermore, 
that  we  have  not  for  many  years  been  so  strongly 
tempted  to  cast  aside  critical  restraints  and  in- 
dulge in  '  the  noble  pleasure  of  praising,'  after 
the  fashion,  let  us  say,  of  the  late  Mr.  Hutton 
when  dealing  with  th^  poetry  of  Mr.  William 
Watson.  Nor  do  we  hesitate  to  add  that,  with 
the  possible  exception  of  what  has  been  done  by 
Professor  Woodberry,  no  such  note  of  high  and 


ii6  Editorial  Echoes 

serious  song  has  been  sounded  in  our  recent 
American  poetry  as  is  now  sounded  in  '  The 
Masque  of  Judgment '  and  the  '  Poems  '  of  Mr. 
Moody. 

'  The  Masque  of  Judgment '  is  a  work  that 
labors  under  extraordinary  difficulties.  The  form 
itself  is  one  that  a  writer  must  be  greatly  daring 
to  attempt,  and  the  substance  is  of  a  sort  that 
heightens  the  difficulties  of  the  form.  Like  the 
epics  of  Dante  and  Milton,  it  is  concerned  with 
no  less  a  theme  than  the  cosmogony ;  like 
'  Faust,'  it  sets  speech  upon  the  lips  of  arch- 
angels ;  like  the  ^  Prometheus  Unbound,'  it  per- 
sonifies the  creations  of  mythology.  It  might 
more  fittingly  be  styled  a  Mystery  than  a  Masque, 
but  it  cannot  take  an  easy  refuge  in  the  naivetes 
of  mediaevalism,  for  it  is  no  imitative  exercise  in 
archaism,  but  a  poem  conceived  in  the  spirit  of 
modern  philosophy.  So  true  is  this  that  we  are 
impelled  to  provide  it  with  texts  from  the  writ- 
ings of  the  philosophers.  Professor  Royce  says : 
'  It  is  the  fate  of  life  to  be  restless,  capricious, 
and  therefore  tragic.  Happiness  comes,  indeed, 
but  by  all  sorts  of  accidents ;  and  it  flies  as  it 
comes.    One  thing  only  that  is  greater  than  this 


Literature  and  Criticism       117 

fate  endures  in  us  if  we  are  wise  of  heart ;  and 
this  one  thing  endures  forever  in  the  heart  of  the 
great  World-Spirit  of  whose  wisdom  ours  is  but 
a  fragmentary  reflection.  This  one  thing,  as  I 
hold,  is  the  eternal  resolution  that  if  the  world 
will  be  tragic,  it  shall  still,  in  Satan's  despite,  be 
spiritual.  And  this  resolution  is,  I  think,  the 
very  essence  of  the  Spirit's  own  eternal  joy.' 
And  Professor  James,  writing  in  much  the  same 
spirit,  says  :  '  God  himself,  in  short,  may  draw 
vital  strength  and  increase  of  very  being  from 
our  fidelity.  For  my  own  part,  1  do  not  know 
what  the  sweat  and  blood  and  tragedy  of  this 
life  mean,  if  they  mean  anything  short  of  this.' 
On  the  lips  of  Mr.  Moody's  Raphael,  the  arch- 
angelic  lover  of  mankind,  this  philosophy  is  given 
melodious  utterance. 

<  Darkly,  but  oh,  for  good,  for  good, 
The  spirit  infinite 

Was  throned  upon  the  perishable  blood  j 

To  moan  and  to  be  abject  at  the  neap, 

To  ride  portentous  on  the  shrieking  scud 

Of  the  aroused  flood. 

And  halcyon  hours  to  preen  and  prate  in  the  boon 

Tropical  afternoon. 

<  Not  in  vain,  not  in  vain. 

The  spirit  hath  its  sanguine  stain. 


ii8  Editorial  Echoes 

And  from  its  senses  five  doth  peer 

As  a  fawn  from  the  green  windows  of  a  woadj 

Slave  of  the  panic  woodland  fear, 

Boon-fellow  in  the  game  of  blood  and  lust 

That  fills  with  tragic  mirth  the  woodland  year; 

Searched  with  starry  agonies 

Through  the  breast  and  through  the  reins. 

Maddened  and  led  by  lone  moon-wandering  cries. 

Dust  unto  dust  complains. 

Dust  laugheth  out  to  dust, 

Sod  unto  sod  moves  fellowship. 

And  the  soul  utters,  as  she  must. 

Her  meanings  with  a  loose  and  carnal  lip 5 

But  deep  in  her  ambiguous  eyes 

Forever  shine  and  slip 

Quenchless  expectancies, 

And  in  a  far-off  day  she  seems  to  put  her  trust.' 

Again,  and  in  still  clearer  language,  the  archangel 
declares  the  glory  of  man's  passionate  self- 
contradictions  : 

*  I  have  walked 
The  rings  of  planets  where  strange-colored  moons 
Hung  thick  as  dew,  in  ocean  orchards  feared 
The  glaucous  tremble  of  the  living  boughs 
Whose  fruit  hath  life  and  purpose j  but  nowhere 
Found  any  law  but  this:  Passion  is  power. 
And,  kindly  tempered,  saves.     All  things  declare 
Struggle  hath  deeper  peace  than  sleep  can  bring: 
The  restlessness  that  put  creation  forth 
Impure  and  violent,  held  holier  calm 
Than  that  Nirvana  whence  it  wakened  Him.' 


Literature  and  Criticism       119 

Thus  the  way  is  prepared  for  the  Divine 
Tragedy.  God,  having  created  the  race  of  men, 
and  having  sought  to  save  man  from  himself  by 
the  mystery  of  the  Incarnation,  determines  at 
last  to  destroy  the  impious  brood. 

<  What  if  they  rendered  up  their  wills  to  His  ? 
Hushed  and  subdued  their  personality  ? 
Became  as  members  of  the  living  tree  ? ' 

To   Raphael   thus   musing,   the   Angel   of  the 

Pale  Horse  makes  reply  : 

*  A  whisper  grows,  various  from  tongue  to  tongue, 
That  so  He  will  attempt.      Those  who  consent 
To  render  up  their  clamorous  wills  to  Him, 
To  merge  their  fretful  being  in  His  peace 
He  will  accept:  the  rest  he  will  destroy.' 

In  the  fulness  of  time,  the  Day  of  Judgment 
dawns,  and  ^  God's  vengeance  is  full  wrought ' 
upon  the  wicked.  The  following  wonderful 
lyric  is  sung  by  the  redeemed  spirits  on  their 
upward  flight : 

<  In  the  wilds  of  life  astray. 

Held  far  from  our  delight. 

Following  the  cloud  by  day 

And  the  fire  by  night. 

Came  we  a  desert  way. 

O  Lord,  with  apples  feed  us. 

With  flagons  stay! 

By  Thy  still  waters  lead  us! 


120  Editorial  Echoes 

*  As  bird  torn  from  the  breast 
Of  mother-cherishings, 
Far  from  the  swaying  nest 
Dies  for  the  mother  wings, 
So  did  the  birth-hour  wrest 
From  Thy  sweet  will  and  word 
Our  souls  distressed. 
Open  Thy  breast,  thou  Bird! ' 

Yet  Raphael,  who  alone  of  the  celestial  hosts 

has  understood  the  heart   of  man,  and   whose 

imagination  has  foreshadowed  the  consequences 

of  his  destruction,  remains  disconsolate. 

*  Never  again!  never  again  for  me! 
Never  again  the  lily  souls  that  live 
Along  the  margin  of  the  streams,  shall  grow 
More  candid  at  my  coming.      Never  more 
God's  birds  above  the  bearers  of  the  Ark 
Shall  make  a  wood  of  implicated  wings, 
Swept  by  the  wind  of  slow  ecstatic  song. 
Thy  youths  shall  hold  their  summer  cenacles; 
I  am  not  of  their  fellowship,  It  seems. 
God*s  ancient  peace  shall  feed  them,  as  It  feeds 
These  yet  uplifted  hills.      I  would  I  knew 
Where  bubbled  that  Insistent  spring.      To  drink 
Deep,  and  forget  what  I  have  seen  to-day."* 

But  the  destruction  of  mankind  is  only  the 
beginning  of  the  Tragedy.  When  that  awful 
fiat  went  forth,  God  likewise  accomplished  His 
own  doom.     To  be  dethroned  and  destroyed  by 


Literature  and  Criticism       121 

the  forces  of  His  own  creation  is  the  fate  that 
awaits  Him,  as  it  awaited  the  God  of  Scandi- 
navian myth  in  the  day  of  Ragnarok,  as  it  awaited 
the  God  of  Greek  myth  in  Shelley's  treatment 
of  the  tale  of  Prometheus.  The  instrument  of 
His  undoing  is  the  Worm  that  dieth  not,  His 
own  monstrous  miscreation,  who,  having  swept 
mankind  from  the  face  of  earth  at  the  behest  of 
his  Creator,  mounts  upward  to  commit  violent 
assault  upon  the  hosts  of  Heaven. 

« He  mounts! 

He  lays  his  length  upward  the  visioned  hills, 

The  inviolable  fundaments  of  Heaven! 

There  where  he  climbs  the  kindled  slopes  grow  pale, 

Ashen  the  amethystine  dells,  and  dim 

The  starry  reaches.' 

The  closing  scene  between  the   Spirits  of  the 

Lamps  about  the  Throne,  who  have  fled  in  terror 

from  the  terrific  struggle,  and  the   Archangels 

Raphael  and  Uriel,  rises  to  a  height  of  Imaginative 

sublimity  that  leaves  us  fairly  stricken  with  awe. 

*  Uriel  (approaching). 
The  dream  is  done!     Petal  by  petal  falls 
The  coronal  of  creatured  bloom  God  wove 
To  deck  His  brows  at  dawn. 

Raphael. 

No  hope  remains? 


122  Editorial  Echoes 

Uriel. 
To  save  Him  from  Himself  not  cherubim 
Nor  seraphim  avail.      Who  loves  not  life 
Receiveth  not  life's  gifts  at  any  hand. 

Raphael. 

Would  He  had  dared 
To  nerve  each  member  of  His  mighty  frame  — 
Man,  beast,  and  tree,  and  all  the  shapes  of  will 
That  dream  their  darling  ends  in  clod  and  star  — 
To  everlasting  conflict,  wringing  peace 
From  struggle,  and  from  struggle  peace  again. 
Higher  and  sweeter  and  more  passionate 
With  every  danger  passed!     Would  He  had  spared 
That  dark  Antagonist  whose  enmity 
Gave  Him  rejoicing  sinews,  for  of  Him 
His  foe  was  flesh  of  flesh  and  bone  of  bone. 
With  suicidal  hand  He  smote  him  down. 
And  now  indeed  His  lethal  pangs  begin. 

First  Lamp  (to  Uriel). 
Brother,  what  lies  beyond  this  trouble  ?     Death  ? 

Uriel. 
All  live  in  Him,  with  Him  shall  all  things  die. 

Second  Lamp. 
And  the  snake  reign,  coiled  on  the  holy  hill  ^ 

Uriel. 
Sorrow  dies  with  the  heart  it  feeds  upon. 

Raphael. 
Look,  where  the  red  volcano  of  the  fight 
Hath  burst,  and  down  the  violated  hills 


Literature  and  Criticism       123 

Pours  ruin  and  repulse,  a  thousand  streams 
Choked  with  the  pomp  and  furniture  of  Heaven. 
In  vain  the  Lion  ramps  against  the  tide, 
In  vain  from  slope  to  slope  the  giant  Wraths 
Rally  but  to  be  broken.      Dwindling  dim 
Across  the  blackened  pampas  of  the  wind 
The  routed'  Horses  flee  with  hoof  and  wing. 
Till  their  trine  light  is  one,  and  now  is  quenched. 

Uriel. 
The  spirits  fugitive  from  Heaven's  brink 
Put  off  their  substance  of  ethereal  fire 
And  mourn  phantasmal  on  the  phantom  Alps. 

Fourth  Lamp. 
Mourn,  sisters  !     For  our  light  is  fading  too. 
Thou  of  the  topaz  heart,  thou  of  the  jade, 
And  thou  sweet  trembling  opal  —  ye  are  grown 
Gray  things,  and  aged  as  God's  sorrowing  eyes. 

First  Lamp. 
My  wick  burns  blue  and  dim. 

Second  Lamp. 

My  oil  is  spent. 
Raphael. 
The  moon  smoulders  ;  and  naked  from  their  seats 
The  stars  arise  with  lifted  hands,  and  wait.' 

We  have  endeavored  to  give,  in  the  preceding 
analysis,  some  idea  of  the  fashion  in  which  Mr. 
Moody  has  dealt  with  his  grandiose  conception 
of  the  Creation,  the  Christian  Mystery,  and  the 
Judgment.    He  has  shown  it  possible  to  make  in 


124  Editorial  Echoes 

our  own  day  a  very  noble  poem,  as  Milton  did, 
out  of  the  Biblical  mythology,  and  as  Shelley  did, 
out  of  the  most  subtle  spiritual  symbolism.  The 
poem  is  not  without  minor  faults,  and  criticism 
of  the  microscopic  sort  might  easily  detect  flaws 
here  and  there,  words  inaccurately  used  or  inad- 
equate as  vehicles  of  their  intention,  forced  im- 
agery and  moments  of  flagging  imagination.  We 
are  content  to  leave  to  others  this  thankless  task, 
feeling  that  the  superb  merits  of  the  work  make 
its  occasional  crudities  quite  insignificant.  We 
have  quoted  many  of  its  finest  passages,  but  have 
reserved  for  the  last  the  finest  of  them  all  —  this 
glorious  apostrophe  to  mankind  : 

*0  Dreamer!     O  Desirer!     Goer  down 
Unto  untravelled  seas  in  untried  ships! 
O  crusher  of  the  unlmagined  grape 
On  unconceived  lips! 
O  player  upon  a  lordly  instrument 
No  man  or  god  hath  had  in  mind  to  invent; 
O  cunning  how  to  shape 
Effulgent  Heaven  and  scoop  out  bitter  Hell 
From  the  little  shine  and  saltness  of  a  tear; 
Sieger  and  harrier, 

Beyond  the  moon,  of  thine  own  builded  town. 
Each  morning  won,  each  eve  impregnable, 
Each  noon  evanished  sheer! ' 


Literature  and  Criticism       125 

We  should  not  know  where  In  recent  poetry  to 
look  for  the  match  to  this  melodious  and  sympa- 
thetic portrayal  of '  life's  wild  and  various  bloom  ' 
of  passion  and  aspiration,  of  alternating  defeat 
and  victory,  of  the  commingling  of  sense  and 
.spirit  that  makes  of  our  existence  so  confused  a 
web  of  self-contradictions,  yet  somehow  suggests 
a  harmony  of  design  that  must  be  apparent  to  the 
transcendental  vision. 

It  is  clear  that  the  poet  of  ^  The  Masque  of 
Judgment '  is  no  partisan  of  the  ascetic  ideal. 
His  plea  is  for  the  richness  of  life,  for  the  legiti- 
mate claims  of  sense  no  less  than  of  spirit,  for 
the  working  out  of  one's  salvation  by  means  that 
leave  no  human  instinct  athirst.  Nor  is  his  ideal 
one  for  the  few  favored  by  nature  or  circumstance ; 
it  is  rather  the  all-embracing  expression  of  a  fine 
trust  in  the  whole  of  human  nature.  This  dem- 
ocratic outlook,  which  is  somewhat  obscured  by 
the  symbolism  demanded  for  the  dramatic  work 
we  have  just  had  under  discussion,  is  given  a 
more  definite  expression  in  the  volume  of  the 
'  Poems,'  to  which  we  now  turn.  We  find  it 
in   '  Gloucester  Moors,'  with  which  the   book 


126  Editorial  Echoes 

opens,  a  striking  poem  which  likens  the  earth  to 
a  ship  bound  with  its  freight  of  souls  for  some 
unknown  port. 

*But  thou,  vast  outbound  ship  of  souls. 
What  harbor  town  for  thee  ? 
What  shapes,  when  thy  arriving  tolls, 
Shall  crowd  the  banks  to  see  ? 
Shall  all  the  happy  shipmates  then 
Stand  singing  brotherly  ? 
Or  shall  a  haggard  ruthless  few 
Warp  her  over  and  bring  her  to, 
While  the  many  broken  souls  of  men 
Fester  down  in  the  slaver's  pen. 
And  nothing  to  say  or  do  ? ' 

It  takes  a  robust  optimism  to  bear  up  under  the 

spectacle  afforded  by  the  darker  aspects  of  human 

life,  its  physical  failings  and  its  spiritual  agonies, 

and  the  mood  of  *-  A  Gray  Day  '  holds  the  poet 

under  its  obsession  more  than  once. 

*I  wonder  how  that  merchant's  crew 
Have  ever  found  the  will! 
I  wonder  what  the  fishers  do 
To  keep  them  toiling  still ! 
I  wonder  how  the  heart  of  man 
Has  patience  to  live  out  its  span. 
Or  wait  until  its  dreams  come  true."* 

But   this   mood   is  not  lasting,  nor  does  it  in- 
sistently  prevail  in  the   writer's  consciousness. 


Literature  and  Criticism       127 

Whatever  the  defeats  life  may  bring,  the  strong 

spirit  will  not  be  cowed,  nor  will  it  seek  a  refuge 

in  quietism.     Some  stanzas  written  '  At  Assisi ' 

give  us  a  clear  statement  of  the  poet's  philosophy. 

<I  turn  away  from  the  gray  church  pllej 
I  dare  not  enter,  thus  undone: 
Here  in  the  roadside  grass  awhile 
I  will  lie  and  watch  for  the  sun. 
Too  purged  of  earth's  good  glee  and  strife, 
Too  drained  of  the  honeyed  lusts  of  life. 
Was  the  peace  these  old  saints  won! 

<  St.  Francis  sleeps  upon  his  hill, 
And  a  poppy  flower  laughs  down  his  creedj 
Triumphant  light  her  petals  spill. 
His  shrines  are  dim  indeed. 
Men  build  and  build,  but  the  soul  of  man, 
Coming  with  haughty  eyes  to  scan. 
Feels  richer,  wilder  need. 

*  How  long,  old  builder  Time,  wilt  bide 
Till  at  thy  thrilling  word 
Life's  crimson  pride  shall  have  to  bride 
The  spirit's  white  accord, 
Within  that  gate  of  good  estate 
Which  thou  must  build  us  soon  or  late. 
Hoar  workman  of  the  Lord  ? ' 

There  is  not  a  poem  among  the  score  or  more 
contained  in  Mr.  Moody's  volume  that  is  com- 
monplace or  devoid  of  some  arresting  quality  of 


128  Editorial  Echoes 

imagery  or  emotion.  Regretfully  passing  by  the 
greater  number  of  them,  we  reserve  our  remain- 
ing space  for  the  two  pieces  inspired  by  the  dark 
page  of  recent  American  history.  Our  broken 
national  faith,  our  lust  of  dominion,  the  subordi- 
nation of  morality  to  greed  in  our  international 
dealings,  and  our  desertion  of  the  principles  upon 
which  our  greatness  as  a  people  has  hitherto  been 
based,  —  these  are  things  that  have  made  the  last 
three  years  a  period  of  inexpressible  sadness  to 
Americans  who  have  been  taught  to  cherish  the 
teachings  of  Washington  and  Jefferson,  of  Sum- 
ner and  Lincoln.  How  we  have  longed  for  the 
indignant  words  of  protest  that  our  Whittier  or 
our  Emerson  or  our  Lowell  would  have  voiced 
had  their  lives  reached  down  to  this  unhappy 
time  !  But  in  reading  Mr.  Moody's  '  Ode  in 
Time  of  Hesitation  '  and  his  lines  '  On  a  Soldier 
Fallen  in  the  Philippines '  we  are  almost  consoled 
for  the  silence  of  the  prophet-voices  that  appealed 
so  powerfully  to  the  moral  consciousness  of  the 
generation  before  our  own.  We  seem  to  catch 
the  very  accent  of  Lowell's  patriotic  fervor  in 
these  lines  suggested  by  the  Shaw  Memorial : 


Literature  and  Criticism       129 

*  Crouched  In  the  sea-fog  on  the  moaning  sand 
All  night  he  lay,  speaking  some  simple  word 
From  hour  to  hour  to  the  slow  minds  that  heard, 
Holding  each  poor  life  gently  in  his  hand 
And  breathing  on  the  base  rejected  clay 
Till  each  dark  face  shone  mystical  and  grand 
Against  the  breaking  day  5 
And  lo,  the  shard  the  potter  cast  away 
Was  grown  a  fiery  chalice  crystal-fine 
Fulfilled  of  the  divine 

Great  wine  of  battle  wrath  by  God's  ring-finger  stirred. 
Then  upward,  where  the  shadowy  bastion  loomed 
Huge  on  the  mountain  In  the  wet  sea  light 
Whence  now,  and  now,  infernal  flowerage  bloomed, 
Bloomed,  burst,  and  scattered  down  Its  deadly  seed,  — 
They  swept,  and  died  like  freemen  on  the  height. 
Like  freemen,  and  like  men  of  noble  breed.' 

Contrast  this  bright  picture  of  heroic  devotion 
to  a  great  cause  with  the  dark  picture  presented 
by  the  successors  of  these  men  now  engaged  in 
the  bloody  subjugation  of  an  alien  people  who 
have  done  naught  to  ofFend  us,  and  whose  crime 
is  that  they  love  their  country  well  enough  to 
die  by  thousands  for  its  sake. 

<I  will  not  and  I  dare  not  yet  believe! 
Though  furtively  the  sunlight  seems  to  grieve. 
And  the  spring-laden  breeze 
Out  of  the  gladdening  west  is  sinister 
9 


130  Editorial  Echoes 

With  sounds  of  nameless  battle  over  seas; 

Though  when  we  turn  and  question  in  suspense 

If  these  things  be  indeed  after  these  ways. 

And  what  things  are  to  follow  after  these. 

Our  fluent  men  of  place  and  consequence 

Fumble  and  fill  their  mouths  with  hollow  phrase, 

Or  for  the  end-all  of  deep  arguments 

Intone  their  dull  commercial  liturgies  — 

I  dare  not  yet  believe!     My  ears  are  shut! 

I  will  not  hear  the  thin  satiric  praise 

And  muffled  laughter  of  our  enemies. 

Bidding  us  never  sheathe  our  valiant  sword 

Till  we  have  changed  our  birthright  for  a  gourd 

Of  wild  pulse  stolen  from  a  barbarian's  hut. 

Showing  how  wise  it  is  to  cast  away 

The  symbols  of  our  spiritual  sway. 

That  so  our  hands  with  better  ease 

May  wield  the  driver's  whip  and  grasp  the  jailer's  keys.' 

By  the  memory  of  the  fine  altruistic  impulse 
that  stirred  our  national  heart  when  the  suffering 
Cubans  besought  us  for  aid,  let  it  not  be  said  of 
us  that  a  mean  motive  underlay  that  frank  out- 
burst of  active  sympathy,  that  our  protestations 
of  unselfishness  were  the  merest  hypocrisy,  and 
that  our  soldiers  have  given  up  their  lives  that 
their  country  might  be  dishonored. 

<  We  charge  you,  ye  who  lead  us. 
Breathe  on  their  chivalry  no  hint  of  stain! 
Turn  not  their  new-world  victories  to  gain! 


Literature  and  Criticism       131 

One  least  leaf  plucked  for  chaffer  from  the  bays 
Of  their  dear  praise. 

One  jot  of  their  pure  conquest  put  to  hire. 
The  implacable  republic  will  require. 

For  save  we  let  the  island  men  go  free. 
Those  baffled  and  dislaurelled  ghosts 
Will  curse  us  from  the  lamentable  coasts 
Where  walk  the  frustrate  dead. 
The  cup  of  trembling  shall  be  drained  quite, 
Eaten  the  sour  bread  of  astonishment. 
With  ashes  of  the  hearth  shall  be  made  white 
Our  hair,  and  wailing  shall  be  in  the  tent.' 

This  impressive  adjuration  is  supplemented  by 

the  lines   suggested   by   the    death   of  General 

Lawton. 

*  A  flag  for  the  soldier's  bier 
Who  dies  that  his  land  may  live  5 
O,  banners,  banners  here. 
That  we  doubt  not  nor  misgive  ! 
That  he  heed  not  from  the  tomb 
The  evil  days  draw  near 
When  the  nation,  robed  in  gloom. 
With  its  faithless  past  shall  strive. 
Let  him  never  dream  that  his  bullet's  scream  went  wide 

of  its  island  mark. 
Home  to  the  heart  of  his  darling  land  where  she  stumbled 
and  sinned  in  the  dark.' 

When  our  nation  shall  have  won  back  its  sanity, 
and  once  more  learned  to  heed  —  although  at 


132  Editorial  Echoes 

what  cost  we  tremble  to  think  —  the  lessons  of 
righteousness  taught  us  by  the  Fathers  of  the 
Republic,  these  poems  will  seem  as  stars  seen 
through  the  angry  cloud-rifts  of  a  tempestuous 
night,  bearing  shining  witness  to  the  fact  that  in 
our  hour  of  darkness  there  were  some  souls  that 
held  the  faith  undaunted  by  all  the  powers  of 
evil  leagued  against  them.  We  are  somehow 
reminded  of  an  eloquent  similitude  employed  by 
the  late  Frederic  Myers.  Speaking  of  the  judg- 
ment of  the  men  to  come  upon  still  another  poet 
who,  like  Mr.  Moody,  would  not  despair  of  a 
seemingly  hopeless  cause,  he  said  :  '  They  will 
look  back  on  him  as  Romans  looked  back  on 
that  unshaken  Roman  who  purchased  at  its  full 
price  the  field  of  Cannae,  on  which  at  that  hour 
victorious  Hannibal  lay  encamped  with  his  Car- 
thaginian host.' 


EDUCATION 


Education  135 


THE  TEACHER  AS  AN  INDIVIDUAL. 

Those  with  whom  biography,  and  particularly 
autobiography,  is  a  favorite  form  of  reading,  often 
have  occasion  to  note  the  influence  exerted  by 
teachers  of  strong  personality  upon  men  who 
have  afterwards  attained  sufficient  distinction  to 
make  the  story  of  their  lives  worth  reading  about. 
The  literature  of  autobiography  is  full  of  tributes 
—  appreciative,  affectionate,  grateful,  and  rever- 
ent—  to  the  memory  of  the  men  who,  at  the 
impressionable  age  of  the  writers'  lives,  gave  to 
them  the  bent  that  was  to  remain  characteristic, 
inculcated  the  ideals  of  learning  or  of  conduct 
that  were  thereafter  to  be  pursued.  The  affection 
of  Marcus  Aurelius  for  Fronto,  of  Xenophon  and 
Plato  for  Socrates,  are  classical  instances  that  at 
once  rise  in  the  memory.  The  tribute  of  the 
Florentine  to  his  teacher,  met  upon  the  P'iery 
Plain  of  the  Seventh  Circle,  and  reminded  of 

*La  cara  e  buona  imagine  paterna 
Di  voi,  quando  nel  mondo  ad  ora  ad  ora 
M'insegnavate  come  Tuom  s'eterna,' 


136  Editorial  Echoes 

has  been  repeated,  with  every  possible  shade  of 
tender  expression,  by  all  sorts  and  conditions  of 
men  of  the  modern  world,  down  to  the  pupils  of 
Arnold  at  Rugby,  and  of  other  teachers  of  our 
own  day.  The  name  of  many  a  faithful  teacher 
has  been  rescued  from  the  oblivion  that  else 
awaited  it  by  some  such  tribute  as  that  of  Dante 
to  Brunetto,  uttered  by  some  voice  that  has  com- 
pelled the  world's  attention,  and  many  a  reader 
of  such  utterances  has  felt  a  responsive  thrill  of 
gratitude  as  he  has  recalled  the  devoted  ministra- 
tions and  sympathetic  guidance  of  some  teacher 
of  his  own  youth. 

It  is  to  be  noted  that  in  nearly  all  cases  of  the 
class  now  under  discussion,  the  teacher  is  remem- 
bered as  an  individual,  a  distinctly-marked  char- 
acter, a  personal  influence  for  good ;  rarely,  if 
ever,  as  the  representative  of  a  system  or  the 
exponent  of  a  method.  Stress  is  laid  upon  the 
fruitful  contact  of  soul  with  soul,  not  upon  the 
workings  of  the  educational  machinery,  however 
nice  the  adjustment  of  its  parts.  Nor  is  the 
teacher  thus  held  in  grateful  remembrance  be- 
cause of  his  success  in  cramming  the  student 
with  facts,  or  because  of  his  skill  as  a  disciplina- 


Education  137 

rian.  Success  of  this  sort  may  be  accounted 
highly  by  administrative  educational  bodies,  but 
is  as  nothing  in  the  afterglow  of  the  student's 
recollection,  unless  associated  with  success  of  a 
very  different  kind.  It  is  wisdom  rather  than 
knowledge,  sympathetic  insight  rather  than  mere 
strength  of  will,  that  makes  upon  the  student  a 
lasting  impression,  and  leaves  him  with  an  abid- 
ing sense  of  deep  obligation  to  his  mentor.  How- 
ever completely  a  teacher  may  achieve  the  lower 
aims  of  educational  work, — the  aims  that  are 
tested  by  examinations,  and  theses,  and  the  ob- 
servation of  official  visitors, —  a  student  will  feel 
but  slight  personal  indebtedness  if  the  higher  aims 
have  not  at  the  same  time  been  sought  after  with 
equal  strenuousness.  It  is  in  the  realization  of 
these  higher  aims  that  the  pith  of  the  matter  is 
found,  and  school  inspectors  (unless  they  be  men 
of  the  Matthew  Arnold  type)  can  know  next  to 
nothing  of  the  degree  to  which  they  have  been 
realized. 

Many  wise  writers  upon  education  have  sought 
to  set  forth  the  really  vital  aims  of  the  ait  peda- 
gogic; none,  perhaps,  more  successfully  than 
Mr.  John  Morley.     He  says  : 


138  Editorial  Echoes 

*  There  appear  to  be  three  dominant  states  of  mind, 
with  groups  of  faculties  associated  with  each  of  them, 
which  it  is  the  business  of  the  instructor  firmly  to  estab- 
lish in  the  character  of  the  future  man.  The  first  is  a 
resolute  and  unflinching  respect  for  Truth}  for  the  con- 
clusions, that  is  to  say,  of  the  scientific  reason,  compre- 
hending also  a  constant  anxiety  to  take  all  possible  pains 
that  such  conclusions  shall  be  rightly  drawn.  Connected 
with  this  is  the  discipline  of  the  whole  range  of  intellec- 
tual faculties,  from  the  simple  habit  of  correct  observa- 
tion, down  to  the  highly  complex  habit  of  weighing  and 
testing  the  value  of  evidence.  The  second  fundamental 
state  in  a  rightly  formed  character  is  a  deep  feeling  for 
things  of  the  spirit  which  are  unknown  and  incommeas- 
urable;  a  sense  of  awe,  mystery,  sublimity,  and  the  fate- 
ful bounds  of  life  at  its  beginning  and  its  end.  The  third 
state,  which  is  at  least  as  difficult  to  bring  to  healthy 
perfection  as  either  of  the  other  two,  is  a  passion  for 
Justice.' 

Here  is  a  programme  indeed,  one  not  embodied 
in  any  official  document,  and  quite  irreducible  to 
the  neat  formulas  of  methodology,  yet  more  or 
less  distinctly  present  in  the  consciousness  of 
every  true  educator,  and  the  object  of  his  most 
earnest  desire.  Such  were  the  aims  of  Socrates, 
as  far  as  we  may  disentangle  them  from  the  iri- 
descent web  of  Platonic  expression ;  such  have 
been  the  aims  of  the  inspired  teachers  of  all  gen- 
erations since. 


Education  139 

What,  it  may  well  be  asked,  is  the  bearing  of 
these  extremely  abstract  considerations  upon  the 
actual  problems  of  the  present  educational  day? 
To  us  the  reply  seems  very  obvious.  Such  aims 
as  we  believe  to  be  the  most  essential  of  all  in 
education  are  not  easy  of  attainment  at  best,  and 
whatever  tends  to  repress"  the  individuality  of  the 
teacher  tends  also  to  make  impossible  the  attain- 
ment of  these  aims.  Most  teachers,  in  most 
civilized  countries  to-day,  are  so  cabined,  cribbed, 
and  confined,  by  administrative  prescription,  that 
they  are  not  free  to  be  individuals  at  all ;  they 
are  only  cog-wheels  in  the  machinery.  What  we 
are  sometimes  tempted  to  call  the  curse  of  cen- 
tralization has  so  fallen  upon  most  of  our  educa- 
tional organizations  that  the  very  word  '  system  ' 
has  come  to  have  the  connotations  of  lifelessness, 
and  inadequacy,  and  dull  uniformity.  The  higher 
education  has  generally  learned  the  lesson  that 
system,  although  an  excellent  servant,  is  a  poor 
master,  but  the  lower  education  everywhere  calls 
loudly  for  emancipation.  The  teacher  in  a  Ger- 
man Gymnasium^  a  French  ly-cee^  an  English  board 
school,  or  the  school  of  an  American  city,  is  so 
hampered  by  needless  regulations  and   require- 


I40  Editorial  Echoes 

merits,  by  the  drudgery  of  unnecessary  bookkeep- 
ing and  prescribed  written  work,  by  the  exigencies 
of  over-detailed  courses  of  instruction  and  ill- 
chosen  text-books  —  to  say  nothing  of  the  nega- 
tive embarrassment  resulting  from  a  sadly  deficient 
school  equipment  - —  that  he  becomes  utterly 
disheartened  at  the  thought  of  doing  good  work 
under  so  great  a  variety  of  adverse  conditions, 
and  can  only  resign  himself  to  his  fate. 

Take  the  matter  of  text-books  alone :  a  text- 
book is  a  tool,  and  its  chief  excellence  is  in  being 
fitted  to  the  hand  that  must  use  it.  There  is  no 
more  reason  why  a  teacher  should  have  forced 
upon  him  a  text-book  that  he  does  not  like  than 
there  is  for  denying  a  cabinet-maker  the  right  to 
select  his  own  tools.  It  is  irrationally  urged  that 
a  school  system  must  be  based  upon  the  use  of 
uniform  school  manuals;  whereas  uniformity  in 
such  a  matter  is  not  even  desirable,  let  alone 
being  necessary.  In  our  own  country,  we  act 
for  the  most  part  upon  the  crude  theory  that 
administrative  boards  may  properly  select  the 
text-books  to  be  used  by  teachers,  and  the  patent 
evils  for  which  this  notion  is  responsible  are 
counted  as  nothing  in  comparison  with  the  bles- 


Education  141 

sings  of  uniformity.  The  simple  truth  is  that 
uniformity  in  this  and  many  similar  matters  is 
the  veriest  bugbear,  and  that  what  is  needed 
more  than  anything  else  is  the  reduction  of  pre- 
scriptive uniformity  to  the  barest  minimum.  In 
fact,  the  attitude  of  the  educator  toward  this 
subject  should  be  that  every  sort  of  uniform 
regulation  must  give  indubitable  proof  of  its 
necessity  before  it  has  any  right  to  exist ;  the 
prevalent  attitude  being,  we  need  hardly  say,  that 
the  presumption  is  in  favor  of  the  uniform  rule. 
Local  option  is  as  essential  to  educational  as  to 
political  vitality,  and  it  should  be  extended  not 
merely  to  every  school,  but  to  every  individual 
teacher,  in  every  case  possible. 

The  urgent  plea,  heard  at  all  educational 
gatherings,  and  voiced  in  all  educational  journals, 
that  we  need  better  teachers  in  our  schools,  is 
doubtless  the  one  to  be  kept  most  prominent  in 
current  discussions,  and  can  hardly  be  repeated 
too  persistently.  But  when  the  question  of  ways 
and  means  comes  up,  there  are  opportunities  for 
a  wide  divergence  of  opinion.  What  we  most 
need  is  pedagogical  training,  says  one ;  another 
rides  the  hobby  of  increased  superintendence;  a 


142  Editorial  Echoes 

third  finds  in  higher  salaries  and  permanent  ten- 
ure a  sovereign  remedy  for  the  evil  of  inefficient 
teaching.  All  these  opinions  have  their  weight ; 
and,  doubtless,  our  teachers  u^ould  be  better  as 
a  class  if  more  of  them  w^ere  first  professionally 
trained,  then  vs^isely  guided  during  the  early  years 
of  their  work,  and  all  the  time  assured  of  advance- 
ment in  proportion  to  the  development  of  their 
ability,  and  of  a  compensation  befitting  the  high 
character  of  their  calling,  and  the  social  status 
which  should  of  right  be  theirs.  But,  excellent 
as  all  these  things  are,  we  venture  to  think  a  still 
worthier  aim  that  of  making  the  profession  of 
teaching  attractive  by  making  it  one  that  may 
be  pursued  without  the  loss  of  self-respect.  We 
do  not  get  the  best  kind  of  men  and  women  in 
our  schoolrooms,  mainly  because  we  make  it 
only  too  evident  that  we  do  not  want  them.  The 
kind  of  person  who  ought  to  be  there  is  the  kind 
of  person  who  is  not  likely  to  be  willing  to 
submit  to  the  petty  regulations  with  which  most 
of  our  teachers  are  hedged  about.  Too  many 
of  our  public  school  systems  have  as  their  basis 
distrust  of  the  teacher's  ability,  and  even  of  his 
honesty.     Then,  when  it  is  suggested  that  such 


Education  143 

and  such  matters  may  very  suitably  be  left  to  the 
discretion  of  the  individual  teacher,  we  are  in- 
formed that  he  cannot  be  trusted  to  deal  properly 
with  them.  There  never  was  a  more  vicious 
circle  of  reasoning.  The  formula  seems  to  ht : 
first,  to  eliminate  from  the  schools  all  persons 
likely  to  have  and  to  exercise  good  individual 
judgment ;  second,  to  complain  that  those  who 
are  left  cannot  be  trusted  to  think  for  themselves, 
but  must  have  their  work  laid  out  for  them  on 
the  most  rigid  lines.  We  firmly  believe-  that 
this  deliberate  suppression  of  the  teacher's  indi- 
viduality is  one  of  the  greatest  evils  that  now 
exist  in  our  public  education,  and  that  it  offers 
a  field  for  the  reformer  quite  as  promising  as 
that  which  is  offered  by  the  question  of  superin- 
tendence, the  question  of  professional  training, 
or  the  question  of  compensation  and  tenure. 


144  Editorial  Echoes 


THE  COMMENCEMENT  SEASON. 

In  the  early  summer  of  every  year  there  comes 
a  time  when  schools  and  colleges  all  over  the 
country  are  engaged  in  closing  up  their  work, 
and  in  dismissing  into  the  world  of  action  the 
thousands  of  young  men  and  women  who  have, 
as  the  phrase  goes,  completed  their  education. 
They  are,  for  the  most  part,  a  hopeful  body  of 
young  people,  and  those  who  witness  jthe  final 
flourish  of  the  exercises  which  mark  for  these 
graduates  the  '  commencement '  of  their  influ- 
ence upon  a  wider  world  than  that  of  their  Alma 
Mater  must  be  cynical  indeed  if  they  do  not  find 
this  spirit  of  hopefulness  contagious.  When 
should  we  take  hope  for  the  future,  if  not  in  the 
presence  of  these  young  and  eager  minds,  con- 
scious of  their  rich  inheritance  from  the  past, 
and  confident  of  their  power  to  recast  the  future 
into  their  own  glowing  mould  ?  However  our 
own  generation  may  have  disappointed  us,  we 
still  have  faith  in  the  generation  that  is  to  come 


Education  145 

after  us,  and  deep  down  in  most  of  our  hearts 
there  is  an  invincible  belief  that  somehow,  some- 
where, the  ideals  that  have  been  thwarted  in  our 
own  time  by  the  brute  forces  of  selfishness  and 
materialism  are  destined  to  have  a  better  chance 
of  realization  in  the  near  future.  If  our  own 
mood  have  become  that  of  the  '  Locksley  Hall ' 
of  the  poet's  ripe  age,  we  would  not  have  it 
shared  by  the  younger  generation,  and  are  glad 
that  the  mood  which  inspired  the  earlier '  Locksley 
Hall '  still  invades  the  ardent  imaginings  of  youth, 
and  shapes  them  to  the  same  fair  dream. 

It  is  not  alone  because  of  the  hope  that  springs 
eternal  that  we  who  have  suffered  the  disillusion- 
ment of  advancing  years  still  cling  to  a  belief  in 
the  promise  and  the  potency  of  the  youth  that  is 
just  taking  the  world's  burden  upon  its  shoulders. 
We  are  not  altogether  without  rational  grounds 
for  that  belief.  It  is  to  the  progress  of  education 
that  we  must  look  for  the  accomplishment  of  all 
those  things  which  are  not,  yet  which  ought  to 
be,  and  no  one  can  follow  the  educational  devel- 
opments of  recent  years  without  taking  heart  for 
the  race,  or  without  anticipating  a  marked  prac- 
tical outcome  from  so  great  an  amount  of  intelli- 
10 


146  Editorial  Echoes 

gent  and  harmoniously  concerted  effort.  Whether 
we  examine  the  bare  statistics,  with  their  showing 
of  increased  educational  opportunities,  of  a  better 
appreciation  of  the  meaning  of  education,  of  the 
strong  hold  of  humanism  upon  our  systems  despite 
the  assaults  made  upon  it  in  the  name  of  practi- 
cality, or  whether  we  attend  to  the  philosophical 
generalizations  of  those  observers  who,  from  year 
to  year,  survey  the  field  of  recent  activity  and 
sum  up  the  results  accomplished,  we  are  not 
without  abundant  cause  for  encouragement  and 
self-gratulation.  That  much  has  been  done, 
and  done  in  the  right  way,  is  undeniable  ;  we 
have  many  reasons  to  believe  that  the  young  of 
to-day  are  given  a  better  equipment  with  which 
to  face  the  world  than  was  provided  for  the  young 
of  twenty  or  thirty  years  ago. 

And  yet,  with  all  the  obvious  reasons  for  our 
feeling  satisfied  with  what  the  educational  activity 
of  the  present  time  is  accomplishing,  we  must 
reckon  with  the  fact  that  some  of  the  prevailing 
tendencies  of  educational  thought  are  viewed 
with  mistrust,  and  even  with  alarm,  by  many  of 
the  best  observers,  by  profound  and  weighty 
thinkers   whose    views    command    the    greatest 


Education  147 

respect.  Amid  the  clamor  of  pedagogical  novelty 
and  radicalism  the  still  small  voice  of  these  pro- 
testants  penetrates  to  the  attentive  ear,  and  bids 
us  reexamine  the  fundamental  articles  of  the  cur- 
rent orthodoxy.  One  such  voice  is  that  of 
Professor  Miinsterberg,  and  it  deserves  very  close 
consideration.  Let  us  take  the  case  of  the  average 
graduate  from  the  school  or  college  of  to-day. 
Comparing  him  with  the  graduate  of  a  generation 
ago,  we  may  admit  at  once  that  he  has  been  in 
the  hands  of  instructors  of  more  accurate  scholar- 
ship, that  he  has  had  better  library  and  laboratory 
aids,  that  more  helpful  text-books  have  guided 
his  studies.  These  things  are  all  good,  but  they 
are  not  fundamental.  What  is  really  fundamental 
is,  for  example,  what  Professor  Miinsterberg, 
writing  of  the  tendency  to  allow  young  people 
to  select  the  subjects  which  are  the  most  inter- 
esting, expresses  in  the  following  terms :  '  A 
child  who  has  himself  the  right  of  choice,  or  who 
sees  that  parents  and  teachers  select  the  courses 
according  to  his  tastes  and  inclinations,  may  learn 
a  thousand  pretty  things,  but  never  the  one  which 
is  the  greatest  of  all :  to  do  his  duty.  He  who 
is  allowed  always  to  follow  the  paths  of  least 


148  Editorial  Echoes 

resistance  never  develops  the  power  to  overcome 
resistance ;  he  remains  utterly  unprepared  for 
life.  To  do  what  we  like  to  do,  —  that  needs 
no  pedagogical  encouragement ;  water  always 
runs  down  hill.  Our  whole  public  and  social 
life  shows  the  working  of  this  impulse,  and  our 
institutions  outbid  one  another  in  catering  to  the 
taste  of  the  public.  The  school  alone  has  the 
power  to  develop  the  opposite  tendency,  to  en- 
courage and  train  the  belief  in  duties  and  obli- 
gations, to  inspire  devotion  to  better  things  than 
those  to  which  we  are  drawn  by  our  lower 
instincts.'  For  a  student  to  choose  his  own 
courses  may  make  his  education  both  easy  and 
pleasant;  it  certainly  does  not  develop  the  power 
to  overcome  resistance.  That  power  is  devel- 
oped only  by  work  that  is  not  easy,  and  that 
sometimes  is  extremely  unpleasant.  '  The  schools 
were  bad,  and  the  public  was  dissatisfied,'  says 
our  writer ;  ^  now  the  elective  studies  relieve  the 
discomfort  of  the  children ;  in  the  place  of  the 
old  vexation  they  have  a  good  time,  and  the 
parents  are  glad  that  the  drudgery  is  over.' 
Presently,  however,  there  is  a  rude  awakening, 
and  it  is  discovered  that  the  children  thus  taught 


Education  149 

have  acquired  no  mental  stamina,  that  they  do 
not  know  anything  thoroughly,  that  they  cannot 
grapple  with  any  hard  problem  of  practical  life. 
Then  the  man  who  is  strong  on  psychology  and 
pedagogy  gets  his  chance.  For  the  possession 
of  this  apparatus  '  he  is  not  a  better  teacher,  but 
he  can  talk  about  the  purposes  of  the  new  edu- 
cation till  all  is  covered  by  beautiful  words ;  and 
thus  parents  and  children  are  happily  satisfied  for 
a  while,  till  the  time  comes  when  the  nation  has 
to  pay  for  its  neglect.'  '  Just  as  it  has  been  said 
that  war  needs  three  things,  money,  money,  and 
again  money,  so  it  can  be  said  with  much  greater 
truth  that  education  needs,  not  forces  and  build- 
ings, not'pedagogy  and  demonstrations,  but  only 
men,  men,  and  again  men.  .  .  .  The  right  kind 
of  men  is  what  the  schools  need.' 

One  of  the  dialogues  of  Lucian  speaks  —  we 
quote  from  Froude's  paraphrase  —  of '  lies  related 
so  circumstantially  and  by  such  grave  authorities, 
with  evidence  of  eye-witnesses,  place,  and  time 
all  accurately  given,  that  the  strongest  mind 
could  hardly  resist  conviction  unless  fortified 
with  the  certainty  that  such  things  could  not  be.' 
Our  credulous  age  is  beset  bv  innumerable  lies 


150  Editorial  Echoes 

of  this  character,  lies  of  popular  science,  of  polit- 
ical controversy,  of  religious  propaganda,  of  every 
species  of  intellectual  quackery.  It  is  surely 
both  fundamental  and  vital  to  ask  of  our  educa- 
tion whether  it  fortifies  the  mind  with  the  cer- 
tainty that  such  things  cannot  be.  Does  the 
average  product  of  our  most  approved  educational 
systems  know  the  demonstrated  facts  of  physics, 
of  economic  science,  of  the  historical  experience 
of  mankind,  with  absolute  conviction,  or  does  he 
stand  toward  them  in  a  hazy  mental  attitude, 
doubtful  of  their  validity,  and  ready  to  surrender 
them  at  the  behest  of  some  plausible  word- 
monger  ?  This  attitude  toward  fundamental 
principles  is  so  widely  prevalent,  eveti  among 
people  who  have  gone  through  the  form  of  intel- 
lectual training,  that  the  answer  to  our  question 
does  little  credit  to  whatever  agencies  are  respon- 
sible for  such  an  intellectual  outlook.  For  a  period 
that  boasts  of  enlightenment,  the  '  forts  of  folly  ' 
are  still  defended  by  forces  whose  numbers  are, 
to  say  the  least,  disheartening.  Both  intellect- 
ually and  morally,  the  educational  methods  most 
in  vogue  in  the  schools  of  to-day,  in  spite  of  all 
the  zeal  and  energy  behind  them,  seem  somehow 


Education  151 

to  fail  when  we  look  below  the  surface  of  their 
results.  The  sterner  if  less  ingenious  methods 
of  the  past  did  succeed  in  evolving  that  type  of 
'  gentleman  and  scholar '  which  seems  to  be  fast 
disappearing,  and  the  passing  of  which  from  our 
life  has  been  lamented  by  Professor  Emerton. 
The  personal  influence  of  the  teacher  has  become 
lessened,  and  the  pressure  of  the  educational 
machinery  has  become  greater.  And  there  is 
much  food  for  reflection  in  these  words  of  the 
writer  just  mentioned:  'The  highly  developed 
machine  is  able  by  its  very  perfection  to  give  to 
comparatively  poor  material  an  apparent  finish, 
which  may  deceive  the  unwary.  .  .  .  Our 
machinery  will  enable  us  to  turn  out  men  trained 
to  certain  definable  forms  of  mental  activity,  men 
who  can  be  ticketed  off  in  groups  and  applied  in 
various  kinds  of  work  in  the  world.  It  will 
never  give  us  any  guaranty  that  these  are  men  of 
real  intellectual  power,  whose  personal  quality 
can  of  itself  command  respect.'  How  far  our 
insistence  upon  the  machine-made  quality  may 
go  is  illustrated  by  the  growing  tendency  among 
educational  administrators  to  recruit  their  forces 
only  from  the  ranks  of  men  having  the  profes- 


152  Editorial  Echoes 

sional  trade-mark.  Professor  Emerton  makes 
this  pertinent  quotation  from  Erasmus :  '  For- 
merly a  man  was  called  ''  doctor  "  because  he  was 
a  learned  man  ;  but  nowadays  no  one  will  believe 
a  man  is  learned  unless  he  is  called  "  doctor."  ' 
And  the  writer  adds,  in  words  that  are  none  too 
strong,  this  statement  of  his  own  experience  : 
'  I  have  known  many  a  man,  whose  great  funda- 
mental need  was  intellectual  refinement  and 
culture,  sacrificed  to  this  semi-civilized  demand 
for  a  certifiable  kind  of  expert  training.'  The 
educational  tendency  which  can  be  content  thus 
to  substitute  a  narrow  and  easy  test  of  ability  for 
those  broad  and  searching  tests  which  alone  are 
of  real  value,  is  not  exactly  a  cause  for  congratu- 
lation. Here  also  a  fundamental  principle  is 
involved,  and  we  should  look  to  it  that  the  ten- 
dency be  not  suffered  to  impair  our  education  in 
a  very  vital  respect.  The  above  are  a  few  only 
of  the  reflections  that  must  intrude  upon  serious 
minds  whenever  educational  questions  come  to 
the  front,  and  that  cannot  fail  to  exert  a  sobering 
influence  upon  our  enthusiasm. 


Education  153 


BOYS  AND  GIRLS  AND  BOOKS. 

The  curse  (we  use  the  word  deliberately)  which 
at  present  rests  upon  the  teaching  of  English  lit- 
erature in  our  elementary  and  secondary  schools 
is  the  imposition  upon  young  people  o^  a  priori 
programmes.  We  try  to  inculcate  a  love  of  lit- 
erature by  making  boys  and  girls  read  books  that 
they  do  not  like,  simply  because  in  our  Olympian 
opinion,  and  from  our  superior  point  of  view,  they 
ought  to  like  them.  The  result  is  the  natural 
one  that  a  large  proportion  of  our  grammar  and 
high-school  children  learn  to  hate  the  very  name 
of  literature,  and  by  our  injudicious  treatment  are 
cut  off  (many  of  them  for  good)  from  one  of  the 
chief  joys  of  life.  And  yet,  nearly  all  of  them 
have  their  literary  interests,  have  somewhere  in 
their  mental  make-up  the  germs  of  good  taste. 
Any  intelligent  teacher,  free  to  deal  with  the 
problem  presented  by  a  particular  individual  or 
even  a  particular  class  of  students,  can  get  at 
these  interests  and  develop  these  germs.    But  this 


154  Editorial  Echoes 

necessary  freedom  in  diagnosis  and  treatment  is 
denied  to  most  teachers  by  the  stupidity  of  the 
authorities  placed  over  them,  and  they  are  con- 
demned to  the  hopeless  task  of  working  within 
the  rigid  limits  of  prescribed  texts  and  courses. 
The  colleges,  for  example,  announce  that  they 
will  examine  candidates  in  certain  texts,  and  the 
consequence  of  this  announcement  is  that  thou- 
sands of  hapless  young  students  (to  take  two 
peculiarly  flagrant  cases  of  recent  years)  are  set 
to  studying  Defoe's  '  History  of  the  Plague'  and 
Burke's  speech  on  ^  Conciliation.'  Small  wonder 
if,  under  these  circumstances,  the  study  of  litera- 
ture itself  becomes  a  plague,  because  absolutely 
devoid  of  the  sort  of  '  conciliation  '  that  is  really 
needed.  And  if  undue  deference  is  not  paid  to 
the  requirements  of  the  colleges,  there  is  never 
any  lack  of  doctrinaires  among  superintendents 
and  committeemen  to  devise  programmes  that  are 
equally  well  calculated  to  destroy  the  nascent 
liking  for  literature  that  is  the  normal  possession 
of  healthy  young  minds. 

This  way  of  dealing  with  the  most  sacred  in- 
terests of  children  is  educational  quackery  and 
nothing  else,  whether  it  proceed  from  autocratic 


Education  155 

individuals  or  from  bodies  of  educators  in  solemn 
conclave.  It  is  the  proprietary-medicine  prin- 
ciple applied  to  the  treatment  of  the  mind.  The 
fatuousness  of  prescribing  certain  texts  to  be 
studied  by  children  in  certain  stages  of  their  edu- 
cation is  so  amazing  that  words  are  inadequate 
to  deal  v^ith  it.  That  one  man's  meat  is  another 
man's  poison  is  a  statement  as  true  in  psychology 
as  it  is  in  physiology.  Imagine  a  body  of  repre- 
sentative physicians  meeting  for  the  purpose  of 
preparing  a  course  of  drugs  to  be  administered 
uniformly  to  young  people  of  certain  ages.  At 
jfifteen,  let  us  say,  they  should  take  calomel  for  so 
many  months,  quinine  for  so  many  others,  and 
thus  throughout  the  whole  period  of  development. 
The  illustration  is  grotesque,  no  doubt,  yet  it 
offers  a  fair  parallel  to  the  methods  of  many  edu- 
cators when  dealing  with  this  delicate  question  of 
literary  instruction.  Mr.  Ruskin  once  described 
himself  as  '  a  violent  Tory,'  and  the  contempla- 
tion of  such  methods  as  these  should  be  enough 
to  make  ^  a  violent  Individualist '  of  everyone 
having  a  proper  appreciation  of  the  aims  to  be 
kept  in  view  by  the  teacher  of  literature.  'Chaos 
is  come  again'  would  doubtless  be  the  cry  of  the 


156  Editorial  Echoes 

partisans  of  routine  should  their  precious  schemes 
be  roughly  set  aside  in  the  interests  of  the  individ- 
ual student.  But  in  pedagogy,  at  least,  there  is 
one  thing  worse  than  chaos,  and  that  thing  is  the 
sort  of  regimentation  toward  which  so  much  of 
our  modern  education  tends. 

We  are  impelled  to  these  observations  by  the 
examination  of  a  small  book  called  ^  An  Intro- 
duction to  the  Study  of  Literature,'  compiled  by 
Dr.  Edwin  Herbert  Lewis.  It  is  a  book  of 
detached  pieces,  about  one  hundred  and  fifty  in 
all,  and,  as  we  look  it  over,  our  first  impression 
is  that  it  offers  one  more  incentive  to  that '  reading 
by  sample '  against  which  Mr.  Pancoast  has  pro- 
tested so  effectively  in  ^The  Educational  Review.' 
A  further  examination,  disclosing  such  juxtapo- 
sitions as  William  Cullen  Bryant  and  Mrs. 
Charlotte  Perkins  Stetson,  Walt  Whitman  and 
Mr.  William  Canton,  Shakespeare  on  '  the  fop ' 
and  Cardinal  Newman  on  '  the  gentleman,'  gives 
the  impression  that  we  are  plunging  into  a  sort 
of  literary  grab-bag,  and  curiosity  as  to  what  will 
come  out  next  becomes  the  predominant  element 
in  the  consciousness.  But  our  thoughts  take  a 
more  serious  turn  when  we  seek  in  the  preface 


Education  157 

of  the  book  to  discover  the  principle  upon  which 
it  has  been  put  together.  It  then  appears  in  its 
true  light  as  an  attempt  (the  first  of  its  sort  that 
has  come  to  our  knowledge)  to  place  before  young 
people  the  kind  of  literature  that  they  really  like 
instead  of  the  kind  that  their  elders  think  they 
ought  to  like.  The  book  is  based  upon  actual 
experiment  rather  than  upon  a  priori  reasoning ; 
each  selection  is  the  result  of  an  induction  from 
many  observations  rather  than  of  a  deduction 
from  any  pedantic  principle.  But  in  this  matter 
Dr.  Lewis  must  speak  for  himself. 

First  of  all,  he  tells  us  that  the  appeal  of  liter- 
ature should  be  made  to  the  '  highest  normal 
interests '  of  the  student.  Then,  '  it  must  be 
ascertained  by  what  stages  the  imagination,  the 
emotions,  and  the  character  develop.  Theoret- 
ically, there  is  a  masterpiece  for  every  month  of 
the  student's  life.  The  surest  way  of  learning 
where  the  masterpieces  fit  is  to  allow  the  student 
to  "  browse  "  in  a  library.'  The  following  passage 
describes  the  method  which  has  resulted  in  the 
volume  now  under  consideration. 

*  Various  classes  in  the  Lewis  Institute  have  been  en- 
couraged to  <*  browse,""  to  see  if  they  might  not  hit  upon 


158  Editorial  Echoes 

a  body  of  literature  that  would  remain  a  constant  Interest 
to  their  equals  in  age.  However  imperfect  and  incom- 
plete these  investigations,  the  sifting  process,  upon  which 
the  students  entered  actively  and  honestly,  has  been  of 
the  greatest  value  to  all  concerned.  It  has  shown  that 
noticeable  differences  of  interest  exist  between  ninth  and 
tenth,  tenth  and  eleventh  grades.  In  the  nature-sense, 
for  instance,  as  it  appears  in  the  youth  not  hopelessly 
hardened  by  «*  business  "  aims,  there  are  usually  marked 
changes  between  thirteen  and  sixteen.  The  change  is 
first  from  the  child's  scientific  curiosity  about  nature  to 
a  half-poetic,  but  objective,  interest  in  her 5  the  boy 
becomes  capable  of  direct,  unreflecting  joy  in  nature,  or 
even  of  direct  displeasure  with  her,  in  something  of  the 
Homeric  manner^  then  he  slowly  grows  to  sympathize 
with  the  modern  view,  so  much  more  imaginative  and 
sometimes  so  much  less  wholesome  than  Homer's."* 

That  the  method  thus  outlined  is  the  only 
rational  one  for  the  teaching  of  literature  to  young 
students  seems  to  us  beyond  question.  It  makes 
the  work  attractive  rather  than  forbidding.  It 
coaxes  the  recalcitrant  tastes  and  emotions  instead 
of  domineering  over  them.  It  prepares  the  way 
for  that  systematic  study  of  literary  history  and 
aesthetics  that  has  its  undisputed  place  in  the  later 
stages  of  education,  but  is  entirely  out  of  place 
in  the  earlier  years.  We  should  not  be  taken 
to  mean  that  Dr.  Lewis  has  prepared  a  book  that 


Education  159 

may  properly  be  administered  to  any  class  of 
young  people  of  the  age  with  which  he  has  dealt. 
That  would  be  denying  the  fundamental  principle 
of  our  philosophy.  But  he  undoubtedly  has 
prepared  the  best  sort  of  book  for  his  own  par- 
ticular set  of  young  people,  and  a  book,  further- 
more, which  points  to  other  teachers  the  way  in 
which  they  should  get  at  the  interests  of  their 
own  students.  Nor  must  it  be  imagined  that 
his  method  runs  to  '  chatter,'  or  that  it  neglects 
the  disciplinary  aspect  of  instruction.  He  says 
at  the  outset  that  'there  is  need  of  Spartan 
severity  regarding  chirography,  orthography, 
punctuation,  syntax,  and  logic.  The  task  of 
securing  correctness  by  Spartan  methods,  and,  at 
the  same  time,  of  arousing  an  unconstrained  love 
for  noble  literature,  is  the  almost  hopeless  labor 
set  for  the  English  teacher.  Gradgrind  and 
enemy  of  Gradgrind  he  must  be  within  the  same 
hour.  But  there  is  no  escaping  the  double  duty, 
and  no  denying  that  the  second  part  of  it  is  the 
more  important.'  Note  the  emphasis  of  this 
latter  clause,  and  note  also  the  word  '  uncon- 
strained,' which  must  be  the  keynote  of  successful 
endeavor.     It  is  because  constraint  is  applied  at 


i6o  Editorial  Echoes 

the  wrong  points  that  our  schools  make  so  miser- 
able a  failure  of  that  part  of  their  work  which 
should  exemplify  the  most  shining  success.  And 
this  misapplied  constraint,  be  It  observed,  rarely 
comes  from  the  initiative  of  the  intelligent  teacher ; 
It  rather  originates  in  the  councils  of  those  set 
above  him  in  authority,  and  is  transmitted  by 
him,  unwillingly  enough,  to  the  hapless  victims 
of  the  system  with  which  both  teachers  and 
students  are  burdened. 


Education  161 


A  MEMORY  FOREVER. 

A  CONTRIBUTOR  to  our  English  contemporary, 
^  The  Academy/  has  been  sharpening  his  wits  to 
a  rather  fine  point  in  protesting  against  the  intro- 
duction of  school  children,  at  too  early  an  age, 
to  the  masterpieces  of  English  poetry.  His  special 
text  is  found  in  Gray's  '  Elegy,'  and  his  childish 
recollections  of  that  poem  are  decidedly  diverting. 

*  I  remember  how  I  used  to  grind  through  it  without 
one  word  of  explanation  when  I  was  a  little  fellow  often 
years  of  age  [observe,  ten!]  :  each  line  went  by  itself,  and 
one  consequence  was  that  the  thing  in  the  piece  that  im- 
pressed me  most  was  the  reference  to 

**  The  dark,  unfathomed  caves  of  ocean  bear." 
I  had  had  my  neck  nearly  wrung  off  in  those  days  for 
once  saying  that  a  noun  "governed  ''  something,  and  I 
was  not  the  boy  to  risk  further  twisting  by  asking  if  it 
was  the  polar  bear  that  was  meant  j  but  there  was  a  mag- 
nificent remoteness  in  the  dwelling  of  this  creature  that 
always  pleased  me,  and  it  was  not  till  later  that  I  discov- 
ered what  the  verse  really  meant/ 

Continuing,  in  similar  strain,  he  asks : 

*  What  boy  ever  believed  in  the  **  hoary-headed  swain" 
or  the  "forefathers  of  the  hamlet"?     As  for  the  youth 


i62  Editorial  Echoes 

who  gave  to  Misery  all  he  had,  a  tear,  and  gained  from 
Heaven,  'twas  all  he  wish'd,  a  friend,  no  schoolboy  ever 
understood  that  transaction.  And  this  poem,  which  boys 
cannot  understand,  and  masters  cannot  hope  to  explain, 
is  our  accepted  introduction  to  poetry." 

A  like  protest  has  been  made,  time  and  time 
again,  against  the  rigid  drill  in  Homer  and  Virgil 
which  schoolmasters  have  deemed  the  necessary, 
foundation  of  a  sound  classical  education.  These 
names  become  in  recollection  the  symbols  of  a 
disagreeable  experience,  and  whatever  natural  pro- 
clivities a  youth  may  have  for  the  enjoyment  of 
poetry  become  stifled  by  such  a  premature  attempt 
to  force  his  taste.  The  result  is  that,  from  the 
time  of  his  emancipation  from  this  compulsory 
application  of  the  classics,  he  shuns  them  ever 
afterwards,  and,  as  one  humorist  has  put  it,  ac- 
quires as  the  fruits  of  his  training  in  Greek  and 
Latin  little  more  than  the  firm  conviction  that 
two  such  languages  exist. 

There  is,  no  doubt,  a  certain  force  in  protests 
of  this  sort,  and  injudicious  methods  in  the  edu- 
cation of  young  people  have  done  much  to  justify 
the  complaint;  but  there  is  another  side  to  the 
question,  a  side  which  is,  on  the  whole,  the 
stronger  of  the  two,  and  which  there  is  a  grow- 


Education  163 

ing  tendency  among  educators  to  ignore.  The 
great  variety  of  new  educational  devices  which 
are  nowadays  urged  upon  the  bewildered  young 
teacher  are  too  apt  to  have  this  in  common,  that 
they  involve  a  relaxation  of  discipline  for  the 
student,  and  take  from  him  the  sense  of  respon- 
sibility for  his  own  performance.  If  a  problem 
seems  too  hard,  there  is  always  someone  at  hand 
to  relieve  him  of  the  effort  necessary  to  master  it, 
and  he  is  encouraged  to  seek  such  relief  before  he 
has  half  exhausted  his  own  resources.  Already 
many  voices  are  raised  among  wisely  conservative 
educators  of  long  experience,  warning  the  public 
of  the  consequences  of  this  drift  of  our  methods 
of  instruction.  By  dint  of  this  smoothing  over  of 
all  difficulties  we  are  not  developing  the  intel- 
lectual stamina"  that  was  a  product  of  the  severer 
methods  of  the  past;  and  however  glibly  we  may 
talk  about  the  encouragement  of  self-activity,  we 
are  really  playing  with  it,  instead  of  setting  it  in 
the  forefront  of  our  endeavors. 

Recurring  to  the  special  subject  of  literature, 
there  is  a  good  deal  to  be  said  for  the  old-fashioned 
plan  of  anticipating  the  tastes  that  later  years  may 
be  expected  to  develop.     This  does  not  neces- 


164  Editorial  Echoes 

sarily  mean  that  the  mental  maw  of  a  child  of 
ten  should  be  crammed  with  poems  like  the 
'  Elegy,'  but  it  does  mean,  first,  that  nothing  but 
very  good  literature  should  be  given  to  school 
children,  and,  second,  that  it  may  safely  be  liter- 
ature considerably  in  advance  of  their  complete 
comprehension.  The  notion  that  it  must  all  be 
explained  and  digested  then  and  there  is  fatal  to 
the  growth  of  appreciation.  Give  a  child  some- 
thing that  appeals  to  him  in  part,  and  the  sense 
of  mystery  which  invests  the  rest  of  the  work 
brings  the  best  possible  stimulus  to  his  growth  in 
the  right  direction.  And  then  there  is  the  faculty 
of  memory  to  be  considered.  The  disrepute  into 
which  cultivation  of  the  memory  has  fallen  is  one 
of  the  most  alarming  features  of  recent  theoriz- 
ing, and  no  educational  word  is  to-day  more  need- 
ed than  a  strong  reassertion  of  the  claims  of  this 
faculty  upon  the  attention  of  the  teacher.  The 
right  kind  of  student,  struggling  with  the  con- 
struction and  the  scansion  of  his  Milton  or  his 
Virgil,  and  receiving  only  a  dim  sort  of  illumina- 
tion upon  his  path,  is  all  the  while  enriching  his 
memory  unawares  with  cadenced  phrases  that  will 
reecho  in  his  consciousness  through  the  years 


Education  165 

to  come,  and  give  him  spiritual  sustenance  in  a 
future  that  would  be  harsh  indeed  without  their 
softening  ministry.  We  say  the  right  kind  of 
student — the  other  kind,  whose  occasional  exist- 
ence must  be  admitted,  had  better  give  up  the 
pursuit  of  literary  culture  when  it  becomes  certain 
that  the  portals  of  that  paradise  are  not  to  be 
opened  for  him,  and  take  to  chemistry,  or  civil 
engineering,  or  political  economy.  But  because 
there  are  in  every  generation  some  such  men  and 
women,  subject  to  limitations  that  permanently 
exclude  them  from  sharing  in  the  highest  hopes 
and  aspirations  of  humanity,  although  capable  of 
a  life  of  honest  activity  upon  some  lower  intel- 
lectual plane,  let  us  take  good  heed  not  to  add  to 
their  numbers  through  neglect  of  the  agencies 
provided  for  our  hand  in  the  early  years  of  train- 
ing. It  is  better  at  the  start  to  set  the  highest 
aim  for  all,  abandoning  it  only  in  those  cases 
whose  development  clearly  proves  it  unattainable, 
than  to  set  a  lower  aim  merely  because  we  may 
hope  for  its  realization   by  a  larger  number  of 

souls. 

'Not  failure,  but  low  aim,  is  crime/ 

In  the  matter  of  education,  no  less  than  of  the 


1 66  Editorial  Echoes 

subjective  ideal,  these  words  of  Lowell  are  eter- 
nally true. 

A  thing  of  beauty  is  a  joy  forever,  because, 
when  it  has  once  entered  fully  into  the  conscious- 
ness, it  becomes  a  memory  forever.  We  must 
not  expect  this  penetrating  process  to  be  accom- 
plished all  at  once.  Of  course,  no  child  will 
half  understand  the  beauty  of  a  great  poem  or  a 
fine  example  of  imaginative  prose.  Let  it  but 
kindle  his  thought  at  a  single  point,  and  awaken 
his  interest  in  partial  degree  only  ;  the  slow  and 
semi-conscious  development  of  his  intellect  may 
be  trusted  to  carry  on  the  work  of  assimilation  to 
its  completion.  How  many  a  writer  has  borne 
testimony  to  this  fructifying  influence  of  noble 
literature  in  the  mind  of  childhood.  The  follow- 
ing passage  from  Mr.  Ruskin's  ^  Fors '  has  been 
quoted  more  than  once,  but  we  must  quote  it 
again,  because  it  tells  the  whole  story : 

«  My  mother  forced  me,  by  steady  dally  toil,  to  learn 
long  chapters  of  the  Bible  by  heart  j  as  well  as  to  read  it 
every  syllable  through,  aloud,  hard  names  and  all,  from 
Genesis  to  the  Apocalypse,  about  once  a  year;  and  to 
that  discipline  —  patient,  accurate,  and  resolute  —  I  owe, 
not  only  a  knowledge  of  the  book,  which  I  find  occa- 
sionally serviceable,  but  much  of  my  general  ..power  of 
taking  pains,  and  the  best  part  of  my  taste  in  literature.' 


Education  167 

Our  modern  education  is  at  fault  if  it  does  not 

find  place  for  some  such  discipline  as  this  during 

those  precious  early  years  — so  soon  at  an  end  — 

when   the  fresh  receptivity  of  the  mind  is  not 

dulled,  and  the  rpemory  cheerfully  responds  to 

the  stimulus  of  serious  reading.      Most  men  in 

middle  life  find  that  they  preserve  a  more  vivid 

recollection  of  their  reading  of  twenty  or  thirty 

years  ago  than  of  the  reading  done  by  them  at  a 

very  recent  date. 

There  is  perhaps  no  other  of  the  great  poets  of 

the  world  quite  equal  to  Virgil  in  the  possession 

of  the  quality  whereby  the  phrases  imperfectly 

apprehended  by  childhood  become  an  ever  richer 

possession  as  time  rolls  by.     For  two  thousand 

years  the  mintage  of  his  thought  has  had  this 

magical  power  to  associate  itself  with  the  tender- 

est  memories  and  the  inmost  sympathies  of  men. 

We  all  know  Arnold's  exquisite  reference  to  the 

<  Virglllan  cry, 
The  sense  of  tears  in  mortal  things.' 

We  all  know,  too,  the  series  of  instances  so 
effectively  marshalled  by  Mr.  Frederic  Myers  in 
that  essay  on  Virgil  which  is  *•  classical '  in  more 
senses  than  one.    Less  familiar,  however,  are  the 


i68  Editorial  Echoes 

two  passages  adduced  in  support  of  this  claim  by 
a  correspondent  of  The  Nation/  passages  which 
reveal  the  minds  of  Robert  Louis  Stevenson  and 
John  Henry  Newman,  so  dissimilar  in  most  re- 
spects, for  once  working  in  complete  harmony. 
This  is  what  we  find  in  '  The  Ebb-Tide ': 

*  The  Virgil,  which  he  could  not  exchange  against  a 
meal,  had  often  consoled  him  in  his  hunger.  He  would 
study  it,  .  .  .  seeking  favorite  passages,  and  finding 
new  ones  only  less  beautiful  because  they  lacked  the  con- 
secration and  remembrance.  Or  he  would  pause  on 
random  country  walks,  sit  on  the  pathside,  gazing  over 
the  sea  on  the  mountains  of  Eimeo,  and  dip  into  the 
*<^neid,''  seeking  sortes.  And  if  the  oracle  (as  is  the 
way  of  oracles)  replied  with  no  very  certain  or  encour- 
aging voice,  visions  of  England,  at  least,  would  throng 
upon  the  exile's  memory  —  the  busy  school-room,  the 
green  playing-fields,  holidays  at  home,  and  the  perennial 
roar  of  London,  and  the  fireside,  and  the  white  head  of 
his  father.  For  it  is  the  destiny  of  these  grave,  restrained, 
and  classic  writers,  with  whom  we  make  enforced  and 
often  painful  acquaintance  at  school,  to  pass  into  the 
blood  and  become  native  in  the  memory  j  so  that  a  phrase 
of  Virgil  speaks  not  so  much  of  Mantua  or  Augustus, 
but  of  English  places  and  the  student's  own  irrevocable 
youth.' 

The  other  excerpt  is  from  the  '  Grammar  of 
Assent,'  and  links  with  the  name  of  Virgil  the 
suggestion  of  Homer  and  Horace : 


Education  169 

<  Passages  which  to  a  boy  are  but  rhetorical  common- 
places, neither  better  nor  worse  than  a  hundred  others 
which  3ny  clever  writer  might  supply,  which  he  gets  by 
heart  and  thinks  very  fine,  and  imitates,  as  he  thinks, 
successfully  in  his  own  flowing  versification,  at  length 
come  home  to  him  when  long  years  have  passed  and  he 
has  had  experience  of  life,  and  pierce  him  as  if  he  had 
never  before  known  them,  with  their  sad  earnestness  and 
vivid  exactness.  Then  he  comes  to  understand  how  it  is 
that  lines,  the  birth  of  some  chance  morning  or  evening 
at  an  Ionian  festival,  or  among  the  Sabine  hills,  have 
lasted  generation  after  generation  for  thousands  of  years, 
with  a  power  over  the  mind,  and  a  charm,  which  the  cur- 
rent literature  of  his  own  day,  with  all  its  obvious  advan- 
tages, is  utterly  unable  to  rival.  Perhaps  this  is  the  reason 
of  the  mediaeval  opinion  about  Virgil,  as  if  a  prophet  or 
magician i  his  single  words  and  phrases,  his  pathetic  half- 
lines,  giving  utterance,  as  the  voice  of  Nature  herself,  to 
that  pain  and  weariness,  yet  hope  of  better  things,  which 
is  the  experience  of  her  children  in  every  time.* 

The  seeming  drudgery  of  the  old-fashioned  type 
of  education  was  well  worth  the  while  if  it  re- 
sulted in  such  memory-deposits  as  these,  and  it 
becomes  little  less  than  a  crime  to  waste  the 
opportunity,  which  early  youth  alone  offers,  of 
fertilizing  the  mind  with  the  pollen  that  may,  if  all 
goes  well,  yield  such  a  harvest  in  the  later  years. 


1 70  Editorial  Echoes 


SCIENCE    IN    SECONDARY 
SCHOOLS. 

Professor  N.  S.  Shaler,  in  a  recent  contribu- 
tion to  '  Science,'  tells  the  following  story  : 

<  The  professor  of  mineralogy  in  Harvard  University 
one  day  observed  two  young  women  examining  his  min- 
eral cabinet,  one  of  whom  was  evidently  searching  for 
some  particular  species.  Offering  his  help,  he  found  that 
the  object  of  her  quest  was  feldspar.  When  shown  the 
mineral  she  seemed  very  much  interested  in  the  specimens, 
expressing  herself  as  gratified  at  having  the  chance  to  see 
and  touch  them.  The  professor  asked  her  why  she  so 
desired  to  see  the  particular  mineral.  The  answer  was 
that  for  some  years  she  had  been  obliged  to  teach  in  a 
neighboring  high  school,  among  other  things,  mineralogy 
and  geology,  and  that  the  word  feldspar  occured  so  often 
in  the  text-book  that  her  curiosity  had  become  aroused 
as  to  its  appearance.' 

Upon  reading  such  a  story,  the  first  impulse  of 
anyone  having  to  do  with  educational  work  is 
to  make  it  the  text  for  a  disquisition  upon  the 
incapacity  that  our  schools  so  often  serve  to 
shelter.  Undoubtedly,  the  gravest  defect  in  our 
system  of  public  education  is  that  it  gives  employ- 


Education  171 

ment  to,  or  rather  that  it  is  forced  to  put  up 
with,  teachers  who  have  no  scientific  knowledge 
of  the  subjects  in  which  they  give  what  is  called 
instruction.  But  this  theme  is  so  well-worn  that 
we  should  despair  of  finding  anything  new  to  say 
about  it.  There  is,  however,  an  aspect  of  the 
matter  that  is  comparatively  neglected,  and  upon 
which  it  may  be  well  to  ofFer  a  few  reflections. 
Professor  Shaler  has  a  well-earned  reputation 
as  a  specialist  in  geology,  but  he  proves  to  be 
unlike  most  specialists  in  one  very  important 
respect.  Instead  of  urging,  as  many  men  would 
have  done  under  the  circumstances,  a  better  school 
equipment  in  geology,  and  the  employment  of 
carefully-trained  teachers,  he  questions  the  advis- 
ability of  including  his  subject  at  all  in  the  work 
of  the  secondary  school.     He  says  : 

*  For  my  own  part,  while  it  seems  to  me  that  some 
general  notions  concerning  the  history  of  the  earth  may 
very  well  be  given  to  children,  and  this  as  information,  it 
is  futile  to  essay  any  study  in  this  science  which  is  intended 
to  make  avail  of  its  larger  educative  influences  with  im- 
mature youths.  The  educative  value  of  geology  depends 
upon  an  ability  to  deal  with  the  large  conceptions  of 
space,  time,  and  the  series  of  developments  of  energy 
which  can  only  be  compassed  by  mature  minds.  Imma- 
ture youths,  even  if  they  intend  to  win  the  utmost  profit 


172  Editorial  Echoes 

from  geology,  would  be  better  occupied  in  studying  the 
elementary  tangible  facts  of  those  sciences  such  as  chem- 
istry, physics,  or  biology,  sciences  which  in  their  synthesis 
constitute  geology,  rather  than  in  a  vain  endeavor  to  deal 
in  an  immediate  way  with  a  learning  which  in  a  good 
measure  to  be  profitable  has  to  be  approached  with  a  well 
developed  mind.  The  very  fact  that  any  considerable 
geological  problem  is  likely  to  involve  in  its  discussion 
some  knowledge  of  physics,  chemistry,  zoology,  and 
botany  is  sufficient  reason  for  postponing  the  study  until 
the  pupil  is  nearly  adult.' 

One  of  the  most  satisfactory  features  of  the 
discussion  of  which  secondary  education  has 
recently  been  made  the  subject  is  the  tendency 
to  concentrate  the  work  in  natural  science  upon 
a  few  subjects,  in  order  to  do  fuller  justice  to 
whatever  work  of  that  class  is  attempted.  There 
is  a  growing  recognition  of  the  simple  fact  that 
science  is  a  discipline  and  not  a  mere  matter  of 
information,  and  those  who  best  appreciate  the 
value  of  science  in  secondary  education  are  com- 
ing to  realize  that  better  results  may  be  gained 
by  the  serious  study  of  two  or  three  subjects  than 
by  the  superficial  survey  of  half  a  dozen.  As 
long  as  science-teaching  was  an  affair  of  the  text- 
book and  the  memoriter  exercise,  it  did  not  much 
matter  whether  the  subjects  taught  were  few  or 


Education  173 

many ;  in  either  case,  they  contributed  next  to 
nothing  to  the  student's  intellectual  growth.  But 
we  have  got  distinctly  beyond  that  primitive  stage 
in  our  methods,  and  have  learned  to  recognize 
the  all-important  character  of  the  laboratory  and 
the  note-book. 

This  being  the  case,  we  are  brought  face  to 
face  with  the  fact  that  few  schools  are  large 
enough  or  sufficiently  well-supported  to  afford  the 
luxury  of  half  a  dozen  laboratory  outfits,  and  that 
the  old-fashioned  high -school  curriculum,  with 
its  '  fourteen  weeks  '  in  this  science  and  its  half- 
year  in  that,  has  become  hopelessly  antiquated. 
The  reason  why  the  young  woman  in  Professor 
Shaler's  story  had  never  seen  a  piece  of  feldspar 
was  probably  that  she  had  been  set  to  teach, 
besides  geology,  a  medley  of  such  subjects  as 
physics,  chemistry,  botany,  zoology,  astronomy, 
and  human  physiology.  Under  the  circumstances 
it  would  have  been  unreasonable  to  expect  her 
to  know  feldspar  by  sight ;  or,  for  that  matter, 
to  dissect  a  cat,  or  perform  an  operation  in  quan- 
titative analysis.  Professor  Tarr,  in  '  The  Edu- 
cational Review,'  gives  us  a  delightful  bit  of 
personal  experience  with  the  system  that  produces 


174  Editorial  Echoes 

science  teachers  who  have  never  seen  feldspar  to 
know  it.  He  says  :  *•  A  short  time  ago,  I  found 
a  teacher  in  a  normal  school  in  the  State  of  New 
York,  who,  with  the  aid  of  an  assistant,  was 
obliged  to  try  to  train  teachers  to  impart  instruc- 
tion in  physiology,  anatomy,  zoology,  botany, 
geology,  physical  geography,  geography  proper, 
astronomy,  physics,  and  chemistry.  Now  tem- 
perance physiology  is  added.'  The  sooner  the 
absurdity  of  such  an  attempt  is  realized,  and  the 
sooner  our  high  schools  throw  overboard  two- 
thirds  of  this  ill-assorted  cargo,  the  more  likely 
science  will  be  to  justify  the  claims  that  have  so 
long  been  made  on  its  behalf,  and  that  have  thus 
far  remained  at  ludicrous  variance  with  its  results, 
as  far,  at  least,  as  three-fourths  of  our  high 
schools  and  colleges  are  concerned. 

Professor  Tarr's  suggestion  for  the  reorgani- 
zation of  science  work  in  the  secondary  school 
is  worthy  of  consideration,  although  we  think 
that  it  makes  too  great  a  concession  to  an  un- 
worthy popular  ideal.  He  urges,  in  brief,  that 
each  secondary  school  should  make  a  specialty 
of  one  scientific  subject,  teaching  it  in  the  most 
approved  modern  way,  with  the  help  of  collec- 


Education  175 

tions,  apparatus,  and  laboratories.  The  other 
subjects,  in  response  to '  the  demand  of  the  people 
for  information  in  the  various  branches  of  national 
science,'  should  be  distinctly  classed  (for  that 
school)  as  '  minor  sciences,'  and  pursued  in  the 
old  superficial  way.  Meanwhile,  the  colleges 
should  come  to  the  aid  of  the  schools  by  permit- 
ting a  greater  freedom  of  choice  in  their  entrance 
requirements,  so  that  preparatory  work  done  in 
one  subject  should  be  as  available  for  admission 
as  work  done  in  any  other,  provided  that  it  meet 
a  somewhat  rigid  set  of  conditions  as  to  methods 
and  time  employed. 

While  some  such  plan  as  this  may  be  found 
necessary,  as  marking  the  transitional  stage  of 
secondary  work  in  which  we  are  likely  to  remain 
for  some  years  yet,  it  can  hardly  be  urged  as  a 
finality.  Our  ultimate  aim  must  be,  in  all  the. 
grades  of  school  and  college  work,  to  secure  the 
best,  even  at  the  cost  of  a  somewhat  ruthless 
treatment  of  the  indefensible  popular  notion. 
We  must  resolutely  seek  to  subordinate  the 
ideal  of  information  to  the  ideal  of  discipline, 
and  be  willing  to  relegate  to  personal  tastes 
and  later  opportunities  the  acquisition  of  knowl- 


176  Editorial  Echoes 

edge  upon  many  subjects  of  the  highest  scientific 
importance.  What  is  all-important  to  the  stu- 
dent is  a  comprehension  of  the  method  of 
science ;  he  may  safely  be  left,  if  this  is  once 
given  him,  to  possess  himself  of  as  much  of  the 
matter  as  his  inclinations  and  interests  may 
demand.  A  narrow  but  thorough  discipline  is 
vastly  better  than  a  wide  and  discursive  range  of 
information.  This  may  be  got  without  the  stim- 
ulus of  a  strictly-ordered  programme ;  that  will 
hardly  be  acquired  except  under  guidance  at 
school  or  college.  Perhaps  the  best  evidence  of 
the  value  of  such  a  training  as  is  here  advocated 
may  be  found  in  the  higher  education  of  the  tra- 
ditional English  system.  That  system  has  often 
been  charged  with  ignoring  many  important  intel- 
lectual interests,  and  there  is  no  doubt  that  it  has 
done  so.  But  its  vindication  may  be  found  in 
the  type  of  trained  intellect  that  it  has  projected 
into  the  arena  of  public  life,  and  amply  satisfies 
the  judicious  observer. 


Education  177 


THE  WORLD'S  MEMORY. 

'  The  world's  memory  must  be  kept  alive,  or 
we  shall  never  see  an  end  of  its  old  mistakes. 
We  are  in  danger  to  lose  our  identity  and  become 
infantile  in  every  generation.  That  is  the  real 
menace  under  which  we  cower  everywhere  in 
this  age  of  change.'  These  words,  pregnant 
with  vital  meaning,  and  deep  in  their  import  to 
our  civilization,  were  spoken  one  day  at  Prince- 
ton by  Professor  Woodrow  Wilson,  officiating  as 
orator  of  the  Sesquicentennial  Celebration.  Nor 
were  they  an  incidental  feature  of  the  eloquent 
and  masterly  oration  in  which  they  occurred ; 
they  were  rather  of  its  very  texture,  and  embodied 
the  quintessence  of  its  thought.  Political  phil- 
osophers who  have  espoused  the  cause  of  modern 
democracy,  and  who  have,  with  alternating  hopes 
and  fears,  watched  its  triumphant  onward  march, 
—  who  have  thrilled  with  its  beginnings  among 
sturdy  Helvetians  and  determined  Netherlanders, 

who  have  studied  it  as  a  peaceful  development  in 
12 


178  Editorial  Echoes 

England  and  as  a  volcanic  outburst  in  France, 
who  have  seen  it  wrest  constitution  after  consti- 
tution from  European  monarchs,  and  who  have 
witnessed  its  subjugation  of  the  great  New 
World,  —  have  always  been  insistent  upon  its 
dangers,  and  particularly  upon  the  danger  of  its 
tendency,  everywhere  manifest,  to  disregard  the 
teachings  of  history,  and  to  reject  the  experience 
of  the  past  —  merely  because  it  is  the  past  —  as 
a  guide  to  the  future.  It  was,  then,  peculiarly 
fitting  that  a  note  of  warning  upon  this  subject 
should  have  been  made  the  keynote  of  Professor 
Wilson's  address,  prepared,  as  that  address  was, 
to  commemorate  the  sesquicentennial  anniver- 
sary of  a  famous  institution  of  learning,  and  to 
emphasize  the  function  to  be  performed  for  our 
civilization  by  all  such  institutions,  if  they  are  to 
prove  themselves  worthy  of  their  trust. 

No  society  can  safely  break  with  the  past  save 
by  a  gradual  process  that  is  content  to  sift  the 
teachings  of  experience,  and  reject  only  what 
has  proved  itself  prejudicial  to  human  progress. 
Those  who  do  not  sympathize  with  the  past,  and 
would  have  us  once  for  all  freed  from  its  tram- 
mels, are  precisely  those  who  do  not  understand 


Education  179 

the  past,  and  are  persuaded  that  the  essentials  of 
social  organization,  like  its  trappings,  are  matters 
of  fashion,  varying  from  age  to  age.  But  the 
student  of  history  who  has  seen  beneath  exter- 
nals, and  who  has  caught  anything  of  the  spirit 
of  the  human  epic,  knows  that  it  is  foolish  to 
judge  institutions  and  beliefs  and  social  ideals  by 
absolute  standards,  knows  that  all  these  things 
are  products  of  an  evolutionary  process  whereby 
every  people  in  every  century  has  been  fitted 
with  what  it  has  most  needed  in  its  own  partic- 
ular stage  of  culture.  That  for  our  own  uses 
we  reject  such  devices  as  monarchy  and  Moham- 
medanism and  the  mediaeval  guilds,  does  not 
justify  us  in  assuming  that  they  have  worked 
harm  in  their  own  time  and  place.  Rather  do 
we  see  in  the  fact  of  their  existence  and  long- 
continued  potency  their  ample  justification.  And 
if  we  find  our  own  national  inheritance  to  in- 
clude certain  elements  that  to  the  clear-sighted 
among  us  seem  irrational,  impeding  the  steps  of 
progress,  we  should  take  long  and  prayerful 
counsel  before  seeking  to  sweep  them  away, 
restraining  our  impatience  by  the  reflection  that 
whatever  is  deeply  rooted  in  the  experience  of 


i8o  Editorial  Echoes 

past  generations  must  have  subserved  some  useful 
purpose,  and  that  the  possibilities  of  its  usefulness 
may  not  yet  be  exhausted. 

The  universities  clearly  have  no  task  more 
important  than  that  of  drawing  our  attention  to 
the  past,  and  of  encouraging  us  in  a  sympa- 
thetic understanding  and  comprehension  of  the 
past.  Professor  Wilson  stated  one  of  the  deep- 
est of  truths  when  he  spoke  in  the  following 
language : 

'  Unschooled  men  have  only  their  habits  to  remind 
them  of  the  past,  only  their  desires  and  their  instinctive 
judgments  of  what  is  to  guide  them  into  the  future;  the 
college  should  serve  the  state  as  its  organ  of  recollection, 
its  seat  of  vital  memory.  It  should  give  the  country 
men  who  know  the  probabilities  of  failure  and  success, 
who  can  separate  the  tendencies  which  are  permanent 
from  the  tendencies  which  are  of  the  moment  merely, 
who  can  distinguish  promises  from  threats,  knowing  the 
life  men  have  lived,  the  hopes  they  have  tested,  and  the 
principles  they  have  proved.' 

In  the  same  spirit  of  wise  patriotism,  the  Presi- 
dent of  the  United  States,  on  the  following  day, 
added  the  testimony  of  the  statesman  to  that  of 
the  scholar. 

*  In  a  nation  like  ours,  charged  with  the  care  of  nu- 
merous and  widely  varied  interests,  a  spirit  of  conserva- 


Education  i8i 

tism  and  toleration  is  absolutely  essential.  A  collegiate 
training,  the  study  of  principles  unvexed  by  distracting 
and  misleading  influences,  and  a  correct  apprehension  of 
the  theories  upon  which  our  republic  is  established, 
ought  to  constitute  the  college  graduate  a  constant  mon- 
itor, warning  against  popular  rashness  and  excess.' 

How  greatly  we  need  as  a  nation  to  take  to 
heart  such  doctrine  as  this,  is  only  too  clearly 
proved  by  the  political  record  of  the  past  quarter- 
century.  '  Popular  rashness  and  excess '  have 
been  visible  everywhere  in  the  counsels  of  our 
leaders  and  the  acts  of  our  public  officers.  In 
our  legislation  upon  some  of  the  most  important 
subjects  of  public  concern  we  have  run  the 
whole  gamut  of  folly,  delusion,  and  fatuous 
ignorance  of  the  operations  of  natural  law. 
We  have  set  at  defiance  the  best-established 
principles  of  political  and  economic  thought,  and 
have  learned  our  lesson  so  ill  that  no  sooner 
have  we  recovered  in  part  from  one  disaster 
than  we  have  rushed  blindly  upon  another.  In- 
stead of  keeping  alive  the  world's  memory,  we 
do  not  succeed  in  keeping  alive  our  memory  as 
individuals.  The  shallowness  and  ignorance,  if 
not  the  criminal  culpability,  of  some  political 
leader  may  be  to-day  so  exposed  as  to  put  him 


1 82  Editorial  Echoes 

clearly  to  shame  in  the  eyes  of  the  world ;  yet 
five  years  later  we  may  find  him  again  a  man  of 
position  and  influence,  trusted  by  those  whom 
he  has  betrayed,  his  support  sought  after  by 
thousands  who  have  either  forgotten  his  past,  or 
are  guileless  enough  to  believe  that  the  leopard 
can  change  his  spots.  If  we  are  to  look  any- 
where for  the  healing  of  our  diseased  memory, 
whether  individual  or  national,  it  must  surely  be 
to  those  institutions  in  which  the  truth,  undim-  , 
med  by  prejudice  or  passion,  —  the  truth  of  yes- 
terday as  well  as  of  to-day, —  is  sought  after  by 
earnest  students,  under  the  guidance  of  men 
who  have  devoted  their  lives  to  seeking  out  the 
causes  of  things. 

Such  a  home  for  seekers  after  truth,  such  an 
altar  for  keeping  ^the  world's  memory'  aglow, 
is  pictured  in  the  closing  passage  of  Professor 
Wilson's  oration,  a  passage  so  noble  and  so 
beautiful  that  it  must  not  suffer  the  violence  of 
dismemberment. 

<  I  have  had  sight  of  the  perfect  place  of  learning  In 
my  thought  5  a  free  place,  .and  a  various,  where  no  man 
could  be  and  not  know  with  how  great  a  destiny  knowl- 
edge had  come  into  the  world  —  itself  a  little  world  j  but 


Education  183 

not  perplexed,  living  with  a  singleness  of  aim  not  known 
withoutj  the  home  of  sagacious  men,  hard-headed,  and 
with  a  will  to  know,  debaters  of  the  world's  questions 
every  day  and  used  to  the  rough  ways  of  democracy; 
and  yet  a  place  removed  —  calm  Science  seated  there, 
recluse,  ascetic,  like  a  nun,  not  knowing  that  the  world 
passes,  not  caring  if  the  truth  but  come  in  answer  to 
her  prayer;  and  Literature,  walking  within  her  open 
doors,  in  quiet  chambers  with  men  of  olden  time,  storied 
walls  about  her  and  calm  voices  infinitely  sweet;  here 
♦'magic  casements  opening  on  the  foam  of  perilous  seas 
in  fairy  lands  forlorn,''  to  which  you  may  withdraw  and 
use  your  youth  for  pleasure;  there  windows  open  straight 
upon  the  street  where  many  stand  and  talk  intent  upon 
the  world  of  men  and  business.  A  place  where  ideals 
are  kept  in  heart  in  an  air  they  can  breathe,  but  no  fools' 
paradise.  A  place  where  to  hear  the  truth  about  the 
past  and  hold  debate  upon  the  affairs  of  the  present, 
with  knowledge  and  without  passion;  like  the  world  in 
having  all  men's  life  at  heart,  a  place  for  men  and  all 
that  concerns  them;  but  unlike  the  world  in  its  self- 
possession,  its  thorough  way  of  talk,  its  care  to  know 
more  than  the  moment  brings  to  light;  slow  to  take  ex- 
citement, its  air  pure  and  wholesome  with  a  breath  of 
faith;  every  eye  within  it  bright  in  the  clear  day  and 
quick  to  look  towards  heaven  for  the  confirmation  of  its 
hope.' 

We  may  fitly  supplement  this  passage,  and  at 
the  same  time  bring  these  observations  to  a 
close,    by    an    extract    from    Dr.    Henry    Van 


1 84  Editorial  Echoes 

Dyke's  Princeton  ode,  an  effort  no  less  worthy 
of  the  occasion  than  was  Professor  Wilson's 
address : 

<  God  made  the  light,  and  all  the  light  is  good. 

There  is  no  war  between  the  old  and  new; 

The  conflict  lies  between  the  false  and  true. 

The  stars,  that  high  in  heaven  their  courses  run, 

In  glory  differ,  but  their  light  is  one. 

The  beacons,  gleaming  o'er  the  sea  of  life, 

Are  rivals  but  in  radiance,  not  in  strife.' 


Education  185 


SCHOLARSHIP  AND  CULTURE. 

The  higher  education  of  to-day,  with  all  its 
endowments  and  auxiliaries,  with  all  the  re- 
sources of  wealth  and  men  at  its  command,  is 
still  open  to  one  of  the  gravest  of  charges.  Its- 
fundamental  aim  seems  to  be  the  production  of 
scholarly  acquirement  rather  than  of  cultivated 
intelligence.  Because  scholarship  is  pedestrian 
in  its  methods,  and  requires  only  industrious 
application  for  its  achievement,  and  because  cul- 
ture is  to  be  attained  only  in  more  difficult 
ways,  and  under  more  genial  guidance,  our  uni- 
versities manifest  a  strong  tendency  to  seek  the 
path  of  least  resistance  in  their  educational 
effort,  and  to  direct  their  activities  toward  secur- 
ing results  that  make  an  imposing  quantitative 
showing,  but  that  leave  much  to  be  desired  in 
the  quality  of  the  product.  The  old  antithesis 
between  scholarship  and  culture  has  never  been 
more  strongly  marked  than  in  the  educational 
programmes   of  the  present  day,  and  the  need 


1 86  Editorial  Echoes 

has  never  been  more  urgent  of  making  a  plea 
for  the  neglected  interests  of  the  latter.  More 
and  more  do  our  universities  tend  to  send  out 
into  the  fields  of  thought  young  men  who  are 
narrow  specialists;  less  and  less  do  they  tend  to 
encourage  the  broad-minded  development  of  the 
intellect  that  culture  demands. 

In  the  complexity  and  variety  of  modern  ed- 
ucation, there  are  whole  tracts  of  thought  that 
may  be  frankly  abandoned  to  the  claims  of 
pure  scholarship.  The  entirfe  region  of  science, 
mathematical,  physical,  biological,  and  social, 
may  be  yielded  without  demur  to  the  work  of 
minute  investigation,  orderly  classification,  and 
logical  construction.  Culture  is  to  be  had  from 
these  subjects,  but  knowledge,  and  the  applica- 
tions of  knowledge,  constitute  the  immediate, 
and  to  a  considerable  extent  the*  sole,  aim  with 
which  they  are  pursued.  But  humanity  is  a 
finer  thing  than  knowledge,  and  the  subjects 
whose  consideration  makes  for  humanity  must 
suffer  degradation  if  we  permit  ourselves  to  lose 
sight  of  their  essential  excellence.  These  sub- 
jects are  those  of  the  literary  and  artistic  groups, 
and,  largely,  also  those  of  the  historical  group. 


Education  187 

although  in  this  latter  domain  mere  scholarship 
has  some  claims  that  are  legitimate.  What  the 
advocates  of  culture  and  of  humane  education 
are  bound  to  resist  most  strenuously,  and  if  need 
be  to  the  death,  is  the  intrusion  of  scientific 
methods  in  the  narrow  sense,  and  the  futile  in- 
dustry of  the  philological  or  historical  specialist, 
into  the  pursuit  of  literary  studies. 

This  subject  is  not  a  new  one.  It  has  for 
many  years  engaged  the  pens  and  the  persuasive 
powers  of  able  men  having  the  interests  of  the 
humanities  at  heart.  But  the  tendency  against 
which  our  protest  is  declared  remains  persistent, 
and  as  long  as  it  controls  the  teaching  of  the 
literary  classics,  whether  ancient  or  modern,  in 
any  large  number  of  our  universities,  it  must  be 
combated  without  ceasing,  even  with  much  rep- 
etition and  the  laboring  of  the  simplest  points. 
Mr.  Churton  Collins  has  said  many  a  strong 
and  vital  word  upon  this  theme  in  connection 
with  the  study  of  modern  literature,  and  we  do  not 
hesitate  to  reproduce  some  of  his  observations, 
even  at  the  risk  of  presenting  ideas  that  will  seem 
hackneyed  to  those  who  of  late  years  have  been 
following  this  conflict  of  educational  ideals. 


i88  Editorial  Echoes 

<  To  say  that  the  anarchy  which  has  resulted  from  con- 
fusing the  distinction  between  the  study  and  interpreta- 
tion of  Literature  as  the  expression  of  art  and  genius,  and 
Its  study  and  interpretation  as  a  mere  monument  of  lan- 
guage, has  had  a  more  disastrous  effect  on  education 
generally,  would  be  to  state  very  imperfectly  the  truth  of 
the  case.  It  has  led  to  inadequate  and  even  false  con- 
ceptions of  what  constitutes  Literature.  It  has  led  to  all 
that  is  of  essential  importance  in  literary  study  being 
ignored,  and  all  that  is  of  secondary  or  accidental  interest 
being  preposterously  magnified;  to  the  substitution  of 
grammatical  and  verbal  commentary  for  the  relation  of  a 
literary  masterpiece  to  history,  to  philosophy,  to  aesthet- 
ics, to  the  mechanical  inculcation  of  all  that  can  be  im- 
parted, as  it  has  been  acquired,  by  cramming,  for  the 
intelligent  application  of  principles  to  expression.  It  has 
led  to  the  severance  of  our  Literature  from  all  that  con- 
stitutes its  vitality  and  virtue  as  an  active  power,  and 
from  all  that  renders  its  development  and  peculiarities 
intelligible  as  a  subject  of  historical  study.  In  a  word, 
it  has  led  to  a  total  misconception  of  the  ends  at  which 
literary  instruction  should  aim,  as  well  as  of  its  most 
appropriate  instruments  and  methods.' 

This  indictment,  severe  as  it  is,  does  not  exag- 
gerate the  alarming  conditions  of  literary  study 
in  the  majority  of  our  universities,  and  indicates 
clearly  the  need  of  a  far-reaching  reform. 

In  the  study  of  the  ancient  classics,  even 
more  than  in  the  study  of  modern  literature,  the 
same    unfortunate    conditions    obtain,    and    the 


Education  189 

young  student's  passport  to  success  and  profes- 
sional advancement  is  too  often  found,  not  in 
his  power  to  interpret  the  ideas  upon  which  lit- 
erature is  based,  and  which  make  it  significant, 
but  rather  upon  the  ingenuity  with  which  its 
mechanical  aspects  are  paraded,  or  the  meticu- 
lous work  of  linguistic  and  syntactical  analysis. 
This,  too,  is  an  old  story,  but  the  importance  of 
classical  studies  in  the  development  of  culture  is 
so  great  that  their  friends  cannot  remain  silent 
while  their  very  existence  is  jeopardized.  Clas- 
sical studies  are  already  too  much  discredited  by 
the  men  of  their  own  household,  and  the  most 
dangerous  foe  of  these  studies  is  the  man  who, 
while  posing  as  their  champion,  does  his  best  to 
destroy  their  vitality  by  ignoring  their  lasting 
claims  to  our  consideration. 

The  immediate  suggestion  for  the  above 
observations  was  provided  us  by  a  paper  on 
'  Classical  Teaching  in  Italy,'  written  for  '  La 
Rassegna  Internazionale '  by  Signor  Enrico  Cor- 
radini.  Of  all  countries  in  the  world,  Italy 
should  be  bound  to  preserve  the  methods  of  the 
humanities  in  its  teaching  of  the  classics  —  Italy, 
the  birthplace  of  Latin  literature,  and  one  of  the 


1 90  Editorial  Echoes 

ancient  seats  of  Greek  civilization.      But  even 

Italy  has  failed  in  its  obligations,  and  allovi^ed  its 

classical  teaching  to  degenerate  into  textual  and 

philological  investigations,  into  minute  studies  of 

historical  and  archaeological   questions.      Signor 

Corradini's  personal  recollections  are  so  much 

to  the  point  that  we  have  thought  it  best   to 

translate  his  own  words  into  English. 

<  To  begin  with  a  recollection  of  my  own,  when  at 
the  age  of  eighteen  I  entered  the  university  for  my  first 
course  in  letters,  my  first  compliment  from  one  of  the  pro- 
fessors was  this:  *<  Don't  you  know  German?  You  must 
learn  German  if  you  wish  to  profit  by  your  studies.''  I 
was  a  youth  of  moderate  intelligence,  moderately  desirous 
of  learning;  I  wished  to  become  a  fairly  good  teacher  or 
a  fairly  good  writer;  I  had  entered  the  university  knowing 
Italian  and  Latin  pretty  well,  and  Greek  after  a  fashion; 
but  I  could  have  expected  anything  rather  than  that  an 
Italian  youth,  desirous  of  perfecting  himself  in  the  liter- 
ature of  his  country  and  in  the  ancient  literatures  of 
which  it  is  the  outgrowth,  should  be  advised  to  begin  by 
learning  German.  I  suddenly  perceived  that  I  and  the 
worthy  professor  who  gave  me  that  advice  must  be  two 
persons  by  nature  irreconcilable,  and  this  irreconcilability 
was  soon  manifested  between  me  and  the  other  profes- 
sors, between  the  little  Greek  and  Latin  and  Italian 
taught  me  in  the  good  old  fashion  in  the  college  of  priests 
and  the  much  Greek  and  Latin  and  Italian  which  they 
wished  to  teach  me,  scientifically  and  by  modern  meth- 
ods, in  the  university.      Thus  my  four  or  five  years  of 


Education  191 

the  university  were  for  me,  and,  God  helping  me,  will 
remain,  the  most  Beotian  of  my  whole  life.  What  had 
happened  ?  I  had  found  the  historical  method,  naturally 
the  German,  in  full  flower  at  the  university;  that  is  to 
say,  a  manner  of  teaching  on  the  part  of  the  professors 
and  a  manner  of  learning  on  the  part  of  my  fellow- 
students  in  no  wise  corresponding  to  my  intellectual  and 
moral  inclinations,  whether  I  wished  to  become  a  fair 
teacher  or  a  fair  man  of  letters,  not  corresponding  to  the 
nature  of  those  same  classical  studies,  or  their  genial  tra- 
dition among  us  since  the  days  of  the  Renaissance,  not 
corresponding  to  the  purpose  of  preparing  youths  for 
teaching,  to  the  vital  character  of  our  people,  to  the  am- 
bition of  any  intellect  or  any  talent,  however  modest. 
I  found,  in  short,  in  place  of  geniality  and  moral  con- 
sciousness, patient,  frivolous,  and  futile  research;  in  place 
of  any  attempt  of  the  spirit  of  man,  brought  into  contact 
with  the  most  beautiful  literature  in  the  world,  to  impart 
its  fire  and  force  to  hundreds  of  youths,  I  found  certain 
cold  and  dull  ultramontane  senilities  forcing  youths  to 
Benedictine  tasks  of  minute  philology  and  minute  history, 
that  they  might  acquire  a  perfectly  useless  education  de 
luxe,  whatever  serious  work  they  might  otherwise  have 
wished  to  do.  In  place  of  what  we  are  accustomed  to 
call  belles-lettres,  I  found  a  scientific  criticism,  so-called 
by  the  ridiculous  vanity  of  those  who  practise  it.  Homer 
and  Demosthenes,  Virgil  and  Caesar,  Dante  and  Petrarch, 
as  if  not  sufficiently  outraged  by  the  fate  that  for  centuries 
turned  them  over  to  priests  and  monks,  had  suff'ered  final 
disaster  by  falling  into  the  hands  of  the  new  Byzantines 
from  Austria  and  Prussia/ 

The  language  is  strong,  but  who  shall  say  that 


192  Editorial  Echoes 

the  strictures  are  unjust  ?  Those  who  make 
themselves  the  partisans  of  this  sort  of  classical 
teaching  are  apt  to  say  that  they  are  opposing 
positive  knowledge  to  the  nebulous  theories  of 
the  rhetoricians  and  asstheticians.  But  these 
may  also  claim  a  positive  character  for  their 
teachings,  and  they  may  add,  furthermore,  in  the 
words  of  our  present  advocate,  that  when  classical 
instruction  in  Italy  was  in  the  hands  of  the 
rhetorical  aestheticians,  '  the  classical  authors 
were  read  because  they  are  great  poets,  because 
they  are  great  artists,  because  they  are  great 
philosophers,  because  they  tell  us  great  things, 
because  they  are  the  mirror  of  noble  life  and  the 
witness  of  fair  humanity/  And  again, '  if  Greek 
and  Latin  are  studied  throughout  the  world,  it  is 
because  the  people  who  spoke  those  languages 
were  in  large  measure  the  fathers  of  our  modern 
civilization,  and  civilization  is  humanity,  not 
Byzantine  erudition ;  if  Greek  and  Latin  are 
studied  throughout  the  world,  it  is  because  in 
them  is  expressed  the  maximum  potency  of  life, 
fair  and  strong,  speculative  and  active,  with 
which  men  and  races  have  ever  been  animated, 
and  this  too  is  humanity,  not  erudition.'     We 


Education  193 

should  like  to  reproduce  this  vigorous  and  elo- 
quent argument  at  greater  length,  did  space 
permit ;  as  it  is,  we  are  glad  to  have  had  the 
opportunity  of  calling  thus  much  of  attention  to 
it,  and  of  affirming  our  belief  that  it  represents 
an  ideal  of  teaching  that  now  more  than  ever  is 
needed  in  the  work  of  higher  education,  both  in 
Europe  and  in  our  own  country. 


194  Editorial  Echoes 


TWO   CENTENNIALS. 

In  the  Autumn  of  1901,  a  famous  New  En- 
gland institution  of  learning  celebrated,  with 
ceremonies  at  once  brilliant  and  dignified,  the 
second  centennial  of  its  birth.  The  occasion  was 
in  every  way  impressive;  the  sense  of  its  partici- 
pants for  the  spectacular  and  the  artistic  was 
gratified  by  the  pomp  and  circumstance  of  aca- 
demic processions  and  convocations ;  the  intelli- 
gence of  those  who  shared  in  the  event,  whether 
as  eye-witnesses  or  as  observers  from  a  distance, 
was  gratified  by  the  exhibition  of  high  intel- 
lectual ideals  and  by  the  lesson  of  historical 
continuity  of  aim  and  achievement  which  the 
celebration  evoked.  Two  hundred  years  of  an 
ever-widening  influence  for  good  upon  the  com- 
munity, of  an  ever-deepening  devotion  to  the 
truth  that  makes  men  free,  constitute  a  heritage 
in  which  the  men  of  Yale  may  take  a  just  pride, 
and  afford  an  earnest  of  the  fact,  half-forgotten 
at   times   by  the   most  thoughtful  of  us  in  the 


Education  195 

stress  of  our  modern  materialism,  that  the  life  of 
the  spirit  still  has  its  share  in  our  national  de- 
velopment, and  still  urges  its  insistent  claim 
upon  the  better  part  of  our  nature. 

A  few  weeks  later,  a  famous  newspaper 
rounded  out  the  first  century  of  its  existence, 
and,  with  pardonable  pride,  seized  upon  the  oc- 
casion for  a  review  of  its  past.  The  incidents 
of  this  celebration  were  a  special  historical  issue 
of  the  newspaper,  a  complimentary  banquet  ten- 
dered to  its  present  proprietors  and  editors,  and 
the  publication  of  a  remarkable  collection  of 
congratulatory  letters  and  testimonials.  There 
were  no  processions,  no  costumes,  no  academic 
functions, —  in  the  nature  of  the  case  there  could 
be  none  of  these  things,  —  but  there  was  a  wide- 
spread feeling,  which  received  manifold  and  often 
unexpected  expression,  that  the  newspaper  in 
question  had  been  one  of  the  most  active  and 
beneficent  agencies  in  the  history  of  our  civili- 
zation during  the  entire  hundred  years  of  its 
publication.  Those  who  are  now  directing  the 
course  of  the  '  Evening  Post '  of  New  York 
have  cause  for  self-congratulation  in  the  record 
made   for  them   by   their    predecessors,   in   the 


196  Editorial  Echoes 

progress  or  triumph  of  the  good  causes  for  which 
their  journal  has .  unswervingly  contended,  and 
in  the  steadfastness  with  which  its  original  aims 
have  been  pursued.  No  one  to-day,  with  the 
century's  history  of  that  newspaper  for  a  guide, 
could  frame  a  more  exactly  truthful  statement 
of  its  work  than  is  provided  by  the  programme 
printed  in  its  very  first  issue :  '  The  design  of 
this  paper  is  to  diffuse  among  the  people  correct 
information  on  all  interesting  subjects;  to  incul- 
cate just  principles  in  religion,  morals,  and  poli- 
tics ;  and  to  cultivate  a  taste  for  sound  literature.' 

It  is  not  our  present  purpose  to  speak  in  detail 
of  the  history  or  the  achievements  of  either  the 
college  or  the  newspaper,  but  the  close  coinci- 
dence of  their  centennial  celebrations  has  set  us 
to  thinking  about  their  comparative  influence, 
and  started  the  question  as  to  which  of  the  two 
has  proved  the  more  potent  agency  for  good. 
The  question  is  obviously  one  that  cannot  be 
decided  definitely,  yet  some  analysis  of  the  equa- 
tion presented  may  prove  interesting,  and  an 
examination  of  its  several  terms  will  afford  some 
basis  for  an  intelligent  opinion. 

Stated   in   its  simplest  form,  the  comparison 


Education  197 

takes  the  following  shape  :  the  college  influences 
a  few  hundred  men,  but  its  influence  is  exerted 
during  the  formative  period  of  life,  is  steadily- 
exerted  for  a  number  years,  and  usually  dwarfs 
all  other  influences  during  that  period.  The 
newspaper,  on  the  other  hand,  appeals  to  many 
thousands  of  men,  but  its  appeal  is  intermittent, 
and  always  subject  to  the  competition  of  other 
influences.  It  is,  moreover,  an  appeal  made  to 
men  whose  intellectual  outlook  is  fairly  well 
fixed,  and  whose  opinions  are  not  easily  to  be 
moulded.  The  college  has  the  additional  advan- 
tage of  exerting  social,  artistic,  emotional,  and 
other  extra-intellectual  influences  upon  the  men 
whom  it  brings  together ;  while  the  newspaper, 
not  bringing  men  together  at  all,  is  deprived  of 
every  hold  of  this  sort  upon  them.  On  the  other 
hand,  the  life  of  the  collegian  is  a  semi-cloistered 
existence,  off^ering  limited  opportunities  for  mak- 
ing actual  use  of  the  guidance  so  amply  offered ; 
whereas  the  man  for  whom  the  newspaper  is 
produced  is  in  the  thick  of  the  world's  conflict, 
confronted  every  day  by  practical  problems  of 
conduct,  and  to  him  the  newspaper  —  that  is, 
the  sort  of  newspaper  which  provides  the  text 


198  Editorial  Echoes 

for  these  reflections  —  comes  just  at  the  time  of 
need,  and  brings  its  trained  intelligence  or  its 
broad  social  philosophy  to  bear  upon  the  question 
at  issue.  This  is  its  special  opportunity,  and 
here,  in  proportion  as  the  reader  believes  in  its 
honesty  and  its  sincerity,  does  it  directly  influence 
him  to  action. 

We  hesitate  to  strike  a  balance  in  a  case  like 
this,  where  none  of  the  terms  concerned  can  be 
reduced  to  quantitative  shape,  yet  it  seems  rea- 
sonably clear  that  the  right  sort  of  newspaper — 
the  one  that  always  puts  truth  above  party,  intel- 
ligence above  passion,  and  philosophy  above 
prejudice  —  may  be  at  least  as  worthy  an  agency 
of  the  higher  civilization  as  the  largest  university. 
Specifically,  we  should  hesitate  to  say  that  any 
one  of  our  educational  institutions  had  wrought 
more  effectively  for  good  during  the  past  hun- 
dred years  than  the  newspaper  now  under  con- 
sideration. But  it  would  be  impossible  to  name 
another  American  newspaper  of  which  this  might 
be  said  for  so  long  a  period,  or  perhaps  for  any 
period.  However,  one  example  is  enough  for 
proof  of  our  contention,  and  that  example  is 
afix)rded  by  the   hundred  years  of  honest    and 


Education  199 

independent  journalism  for  which  the  paper  of 
Hamilton,  and  Coleman,  and  Bryant,  of  Messrs. 
Schurz,  White,  and  Godkin,  stands  to-day  in 
the  estimation  of  the  educated  public. 

The  striking  thing  about  this  example  of  suc- 
cessful journalism  in  the  higher  sense  is  that  the 
success  has  been  achieved  under  competitive 
conditions.  The  newspaper  in  question  has  been 
a  paying  enterprise  without  sacrificing  anything 
of  its  honesty  or  independence.  While  other 
journals  have  achieved  a  commercial  success  by 
the  sale  of  editorial  opinions,  or  by  allying  them- 
selves with  special  interests,  and  suppressing  the 
truth  wherever  it  was  likely  to  imperil  those 
interests,  this  journal  has  kept  clear  of  all  such 
entanglements  and  insincerities,  and  furnished 
an  object-lesson  of  clean  journalism  unaffected 
in  its  course  by  the  claims  of  the  counting-room. 
The  plea  for  venal  and  vulgar  newspaper  enter- 
prise usually  takes  the  form  of  saying  that  papers 
must  be  sold  and  advertisers  placated;  this  news- 
paper has  by  its  example  retorted  that  the  truth 
must  be  told  and  honest  opinion  expressed,  no 
matter  what  the  effect  upon  sales  and  advertise- 
ments.     And  it  is  a  great  thing  to  have  proved, 


20O  Editorial  Echoes 

even  by  a  single  courageous  example,  that  under 
such  conditions  the  financial  returns  may  safely 
be  left  to  take  care  of  themselves. 

This  may  be  taken  as  an  argument  against 
our  old  hobby  of  the  endov^ed  newspaper,  but 
we  propose  to  convert  it  into  an  argument  in 
favor  of  such  an  undertaking.  For  with  all  that 
has  been  legitimately  achieved  for  dignity  and 
independence  in  the  case  now  under  considera- 
tion, we  believe  that  much  more  might  be 
achieved  were  a  newspaper  freed  from  the  neces- 
sity of  making  itself  pay.  In  the  first  place,  it 
might  appeal  to  a  far  wider  range  of  interests, 
and  enlist  the  cooperation  of  a  far  greater  number 
of  authoritative  writers.  If  it  were  frankly  to 
assume  the  position  assumed  by  every  college  of 
high  standing  and  offer  its  beneficiaries  a  service 
that  did  not  pretend  to  be  measured  by  what  was 
paid  for  it,  there  would  be  an  immeasurable 
enlargement  pf  its  possibilities  for  good.  This 
is  the  result  that  might  be  reached  by  a  liberal 
endowment,  and  this  alone  would  place  a  news- 
paper upon  the  footing  of  a  university.  Even 
the  best  of  newspapers  is  forced  to  depend  upon 
the  advertiser  for  its  main  support,  and  the  col- 


Education  201 

umns  which  are  filled  with  advertisements  must 
stand  in  startling  contrast  to  the  columns  that 
are  filled  with  news  and  expert  opinion.  In  the 
very  nature  of  the  case,  and  under  the  best  pos- 
sible conditions,  the  advertising  columns  of  a 
newspaper  are  largely  given  up  to  special  pleading 
and  misrepresentation.  The  commercial  news- 
paper, however  good  its  intentions,  must  make 
this  compromise  with  conscience,  trusting  to  the 
intelligence  of  its  readers  to  make  due  discrimi- 
nation between  the  printed  page  that  is  bought 
and  the  printed  page  that  is  unpurchasable.  The 
great  advantage  of  a  newspaper  that  should  be 
strictly  an  educational  enterprise,  properly  sup- 
ported by  endowment,  would  be  that  it  need  not 
depend  upon  the  advertiser  for  any  part  of  its 
support. 

Our  attention  has  been  directed  to  this  aspect 
of  the  case  by  an  incident  in  the  late  history  of 
the  very  journal  of  which  we  have  been  speaking 
in  such  terms  of  deserved  praise.  During  the 
political  campaign  of  its  centennial  year  in  the 
city  of  its  publication,  that  journal  was  enlisted 
heart  and  soul  upon  the  side  of  civic  righteous- 
ness.    Yet  in  the  very  thick  of  the  contest  its 


202  Editorial  Echoes 

columns  gave  daily  display,  in  the  form  of  paid 
advertisements,  to  the  specious  special  pleadings 
of  the  partisans  of  corruption  and  civic  disgrace. 
There  was  no  disguise  about  the  proceeding; 
the  advertisements  w^ere  marked  as  such,  and, 
according  to  the  accepted  ethical  code  of  the 
journalist's  profession,  the  thing  w^as  perfectly 
legitimate.  Yet  a  higher  code  than  this  is  readily 
conceivable,  and  such  a  code  would  be  made 
possible  by  the  endowment  of  journalism.  Since 
we  are  determined  to  view  the  ideal  newspaper 
as  belonging  in  the  same  category  with  the 
university,  the  absurdity  of  the  existing  practice 
appears  clearly  enough  when  we  point  out  that 
its  educational  analogue  would  be  offered  by  a 
university  that  should  open  certain  of  its  class- 
rooms to  the  advocates  of  dishonest  money  and 
faith-healing  and  astrology,  thus  flouting  the  very 
image  of  truth,  in  whose  name  alone  a  university 
has  the  right  to  exist.  The  fact  that  the  insti- 
tution derived  support  from  this  barter  of  its 
shelter  and  its  sanction  would  not  condone  such 
an  offense  against  educational  morality,  nor, 
rightly  considered,  is  the  corresponding  offense 
on  the  part  of  a  newspaper  to  be  condoned. 


Education  203 


CONCERNING  DEGREES. 

A  MEASURE  providing  for  the  regulation  of  aca- 
demic degrees  in  the  State  of  Illinois  was  intro- 
duced into  the  Legislature  not  long  ago,  and, 
although  defeated,  was  interesting  as  the  first 
serious  attempt  to  do  away  with  what  has  long 
been  a  great  evil  and  a  scandal  to  the  good  name 
of  the  State.  For  several  years  past,  Chicago 
has  harbored  certain  institutions,  existing  chiefly 
on  paper,  incorporated  under  the  lax  educational 
statutes  of  the  commonwealth,  and  engaged  in 
the  nefarious  business  of  furnishing  academic  or 
professional  degrees  to  all  applicants  ofFering  the 
stipulated  consideration  in  cold  cash.  These 
rascally  traffickers  in  titles  to  distinction  have 
published  their  alluring  offers  far  and  wide,  and 
have  found  gullible  victims  in  considerable  num- 
bers, mostly  in  other  States  and  other  lands.  A 
number  of  Englishmen,  for  example,  have  become 
bachelors  or  doctors  of  these  bogus  institutions, 
and  the  swindle  has  attracted  enough  attention 


204  Editorial  Echoes 

to  be  made  a  subject  of  inquiry  in  the  English 
Parliament.  For  a  long  time  the  abuse  has  been 
a  crying  one,  and  those  who  are  seeking  to  end 
it  should  not  be  discouraged  into  inactivity  by 
the  failure  of  their  first  effort. 

In  general  terms,  it  was  proposed  that  the 
granting  of  degrees  in  Illinois  should  be  restricted 
to  institutions  of  approved  educational  standing, 
and  to  this  end  a  State  Commission  was  to  be 
established,  with  power  to  pass  upon  the  claims 
and  pretensions  of  institutions  that  wish  to  bestow 
degrees  upon  their  students.  So  far,  the  proposed 
measure  corresponded  to  the  sort  of  regulation 
that  already  obtains  in  other  States,  and  that  has 
been  enforced  with  such  conspicuous  success  in 
the  State  of  New  York.  Further,  it  was  pro- 
posed that,  in  the  case  of  colleges  to  be  incorpo- 
rated in  the  future,  a  minimum  endowment  of  one 
hundred  thousand  dollars  should  be  an  imperative 
condition  of  the  degree-conferring  power.  There 
was  also  the  wise  proviso  that  degrees  might  not 
be  granted  by  any  institutions  carried  on  for 
private  gain.  The  measure  was  supported  by 
all  the  agencies  in  the  State  that  stand  for  serious 
education,  as  distinguished  from  sham  education. 


Education  205 

but  the  narrow  and  selfish  interests  —  to  say 
nothing  of  the  dishonest  interests  —  arrayed 
against  it  began  the  familiar  work  of  distortion 
and  misrepresentation  as  soon  as  the  measure 
was  made  public,  and  eventually  succeeded  in 
preventing  its  enactment.  But  the  struggle  is  by 
no  means  ended,  for  the  good  name  and  the  dig- 
nity of  the  State  demand  that  the  title-factories 
should  be  suppressed,  demand  that  every  degree 
henceforth  granted  under  the  authority  of  Illinois 
should  stand  for  good  work  done,  or,  in  the  case 
of  the  honorary  degree,  for  an  achievement 
judged  to  be  worthy  by  some  reputable  institution 
of  learning. 

For  the  weak-minded  persons  who  are  willing 
to  purchase  the  fraudulent  degrees  so  obligingly 
offered  we  must  confess  that  we  have  little  sym- 
pathy. It  is  a  pitiful  form  of  vanity  to  which 
the  allurements  of  the  diploma-shops  appeal,  and 
we  are  not  particularly  concerned  to  protect  that 
sort  of  ambition  from  the  consequences  of  its 
own  foolishness.  But  the  public  has  a  right  to 
be  protected  from  charlatans  of  all  descriptions, 
and  the  granting  of  a  degree  is  an  act  that  touches 
public  interests  so  nearly  that  the  process  should 


2o6  Editorial  Echoes 

be  hedged  about  with  all  reasonable  restrictions. 
Indeed,  the  provisions  of  the  defeated  bill  seemed 
to  us  to  err,  if  anything,  upon  the  side  of  leniency, 
and  we  viewed  with  no  little  suspicion  the  stipu- 
lation of  one  hundred  thousand  dollars  as  the 
minimum  endowment  of  degree-conferring  insti- 
tutions hereafter  to  be  incorporated.  The  New 
York  requirement  of  five  times  this  endowment 
would  seem  to  be  the  wiser  provision  of  the 
two,  for  surely  the  latter  sum  is  none  too  large 
for  the  needs  of  any  new  college  that  would  be 
a  desirable  addition  to  those  we  already  have  in 
this  State.  It  is  to  be  noted  that  the  bill  was 
not  made  retroactive  in  this  matter  of  endowment, 
so  that  no  injustice  to  existing  institutions  could 
have  resulted  from  its  enactment. 

The  desire  to  parade  a  degree  of  some  kind  is, 
no  doubt,  one  more  illustration  of  the  instinct 
that  has  created  orders  of  nobility  in  the  older 
civilizations,  that  has  given  Frenchmen  the 
mania  for  decorations,  and  made  Germans  such 
sticklers  for  the  use  of  whatever  official  titles 
they  may  bear.  The  American  character  is 
popularly  supposed  to  rise  above  these  vanities, 
but  this  is  only  a  superstition.     The  desire  of 


Education  207 

the  individual  to  be  in  some  way  distinguished 
from  his  fellows  is  so  inherent  in  the  human 
nature  which  all  peoples  have  in  common,  that, 
if  denied  vent  in  one  direction,  it  will  find  it  in 
another  —  that,  if  not  allowed  the  gewgaws  of 
knighthood  and  rank,  it  will  find  a  substitute  in 
the  mock  distinctions  that  come  from  member- 
ship in  societies  which  shall  here  be  nameless, 
but  of  which  no  reader  will  have  to  look  far  for 
as  many  examples  as  he  needs.  Of  course,  the 
ambition  to  possess  an  academic  degree  is  a  shade 
worthier  than  the  ambition  to  be  a  Grand  Com- 
mander of  something  or  other,  or  to  sport  the 
proud  badge  of  the  Scions  of  Colonial  Tax- 
Gatherers.  The  former  ambition  betrays,  at 
least,  some  trace  of  the  feeling  that  intellectual 
distinctions  have  more  intrinsic  worth  than  any 
others ;  yet  even  in  this  case  how  often  is  it  true 
that  the  external  mark  of  the  distinction  is  the 
thing  sought  after,  rather  than  the  powers  for 
which  it  should  rightfully  stand. 

The  full  force  of  this  observation  requires  for 
its  realization  that  we  take  into  account  not  only 
the  poor  souls  who  stand  ready  to  purchase  de- 
grees outright  at  the  current  market  rates,  but 


2o8  Editorial  Echoes 

also  those  who  bid  for  them  indirectly,  who  make 
gifts  to  colleges,  for  example,  anticipating  in  re- 
turn the  honorary  doctorate.  We  look  with 
righteous  scorn  upon  the  English  ministry  that 
is  willing  to  traffic  in  titles  of  nobility,  —  making 
peers  out  of  brewers  and  stockbrokers  whose 
political  contributions  have  been  sufficiently  lib- 
eral,—  and  how  much  more  contemptible  is  the 
action  of  the  American  college  that  is  willing  to 
degrade  in  similar  fashion  the  titles  of  intellectual 
aristocracy  which  it  ought  to  guard  as  a  sacred 
trust.  There  is  a  good  deal  that  might  be  said 
also  about  the  motives  of  those  who  earn  their 
degrees  in  legitimate  ways.  Many  students  seem 
to  think  that  getting  a  degree  is  the  be-all  and 
the  end-all  of  college  life.  '  Will  it  count  for  a 
degree  ? '  is  the  question  they  ask  when  some  new 
kind  of  work  is  recommended  to  them.  Every 
teacher  knows  this  spirit,  and  knows  how  deadly 
an  enemy  it  is  of  all  culture  for  the  sake  of  cul- 
ture. If  the  spectacle  of  young  men  and  young 
women  actuated  mainly  by  this  motive  is  a  dis- 
heartening ohe,  a  spectacle  even  more  disheart- 
ening is  offered  by  those  students  of  advanced 
age  who  so  often  are  found  in  the  classes  of  our 


Education  209 

larger  universities,  and  who  are  so  obviously  out 
of  place  there.  We  make  no  reference  to  men 
and  women  seeking  to  round  out,  in  later  life, 
the  defective  education  of  their  youth.  Their 
pathetic  case  calls  for  nothing  but  sympathy  and 
respect.  We  do,  however,  refer  to  those  who, 
having  got  far  beyond  the  period  of  their  lives 
when  training  of  the  university  type  was  what 
they  most  needed,  submit  themselves  to  that 
training  for  the  sake  of  its  prizes.  It  is  not  the 
best  sort  of  discipline  for  them ;  it  is  intellectu- 
ally wasteful  rather  than  economical ;  nothing 
but  the  incentive  of  the  doctorate  impels  them 
to  undergo  it  \  the  act  is,  in  short,  an  unworthy 
concession  to  an  artificial  standard  of  culture. 

It  is  this  tendency  to  make  a  fetich  of  the  de- 
gree —  as  if  there  were  no  other  possible  criterion 
of  a  man's  attainments  —  that  is  responsible,  on 
the  one  hand,  for  the  disreputable  business  of 
diploma-selling,  and,  on  the  other,  for  the  spec- 
tacle of  graybeards  engaged  in  the  performance 
of  tasks  fitted  only  for  youth.  If  a  fictitious 
value  were  not  attached  to  degrees  in  the  peda- 
gogical estimation,  we  should  have  neither  the 
one  nor  the  other  of  these  evils  to  deplore.     The 

14 


210  Editorial  Echoes 

common  university  attitude  toward  degrees  is  not 
unsuggestive  of  the  attitude  of  the  church  toward 
the  consecration  of  priests  :  it  is  tacitly  assumed 
that  the  scholarship  has  no  validity  which  is  not 
thus  certified  at  the  hands  of  men  who  have 
themselves  gone  through  the  academic  routine 
and  received  the  consecrating  cowl.  Yet  the 
cowl  no  more  makes  the  scholar  than  it  does  the 
monk.  Again,  those  who  are  banded  together 
by  the  common  possession  of  degrees,  especially 
if  they  are  engaged  in  the  professional  work  of 
education,  are  too  apt  to  assume  an  attitude  sim- 
ilar to  that  assumed  by  trades  unions  toward  the 
outsider.  They  seem  to  say  that,  whatever  dis- 
tinction a  man  may  have  achieved  in  irregular 
and  unorthodox  ways,  he  cannot  really  be  a  supe- 
rior person,  because  he  has  dared  to  court  fame 
while,  forsaking  the  beaten  path.  The  tendencies 
which  we  have  thus  noted  do  not  often  go  to  the 
extremes  of  arrogance  or  fatuousness,  but  they 
go  farther  than  they  should  be  allowed  to,  and 
they  sometimes  work  grave  injustice.  The  presi- 
dent of  one  of  our  leading  universities  spoke,  a 
few  years  ago,  of  the  Roman  emperor  who  wished 
that  all  his  enemies  had  a  single  neck  that  he 


Education  211 

might  cut  it  off  at  one  stroke,  and  then  said  that, 
for  his  part,  he  wished  that  all  degrees  had  a 
single  neck,  that  a  single  blow  might  put  an  end 
to  them.  While  we  should  hardly  express  our 
own  opinion  in  so  hot  a  fashion  as  this,  we  can 
neither  help  feeling  a  certain  sympathy  with  the 
utterance,  nor  help  sharing  in  the  indignation  by 
which  it  was  inspired. 


212  Editorial  Echoes 


THE  FUTURE   OF  ENGLISH 
SPELLING. 

Agitation  for  a  reform  of  English  spelling  has 
been  going  on  for  a  long  while,  both  in  England 
and  the  United  States,  but  the  reformers  have 
received  slight  encouragement  from  the  public. 
The  empirical  reconstruction  urged  by  Webster 
has  given  place  to  the  more  scientific  conceptions 
of  modern  philology ;  but  all  the  reformers,  men 
of  science  and  empiricists  alike,  have  made  no 
serious  breach  in  the  defences  of  conservatism. 
Every  form  of  argument,  from  plea  to  denuncia- 
tion, has  been  enlisted  in  the  attack,  but  the  cit- 
adel has  remained  impregnable.  Even  Webster's 
'  Dictionary '  has  grown  conservative  in  its  old 
age,  arid  bears  but  few  traces  of  the  fiery  radi- 
calism of  its  youth.  The  little  systems  of  the 
phonetists  have  had  their  day,  each  in  its  turn 
arousing  the  public  to  momentary  mirth  or  won- 
der, and  then  giving  place  to  another  no  less 
grotesque  and  impossible.    The  legislature  of  the 


Education  213 

nation  and  the  school  authorities  of  the  locality 
have  been  petitioned  and  memorialized  and  ap- 
pealed to  in  the  most  frantically  misspelled  terms, 
and  have  remained  obdurate.  The  publisher  here 
and  the  editor  there,  w^ho,  impatient  of  delay, 
have  allowed  zeal  to  outrun  judgment,  and  have 
sought  to  force  a  reformed  spelling  upon  the 
reluctant  public,  have  had  only  their  labor  for 
their  pains,  and  made  for  themselves  the  old  dis- 
covery that  man  is  not  a  logical  animal.  Judging 
by  the  almost  total  failure  of  the  English  spelling- 
reformer  to  accomplish  his  purpose,  we  may  with 
peculiar  fitness  apply  to  him  the  words  of  the 
poet : 

« He  weaves,  and  is  clothed  with  derision; 
Sows,  and  he  shall  not  reap.' 

The  net  result  of  all  his  efforts  in  the  United 
States  is  summed  up  in  the  few  Websterian 
forms  that  have  found  a  lodgment  in  usage  (many 
of  these  abhorrent  to  a  delicate  sense),  in  the 
adoption  of  a  few  other  simplified  forms  by  scat- 
tered publishers,  and  in  the  tentative  admission 
to  some  of  our  later  dictionaries  of  an  appendix 
of  amended  spellings. 

In  the  face  of  this  persistent  opposition  to  a 


214  Editorial  Echoes 

change  which  has  been  advocated  by  so  many 
able  scholars  and  supported  by  so  many  plaus- 
ible arguments,  it  is  worth  while  to  inquire  into 
the  causes  of  what  spelling-reformers  have  too 
hastily  assumed  to  be  mere  obstinacy  or  unrea- 
soning prejudice.  The  time  is  past  for  them 
to  say  with  Professor  Lounsbury  that  'there  is 
certainly  nothing  more  contemptible  than  our 
present  spelling,  unless  it  be  the  reasons  usuahy 
given  for  clinging  to  it/  or  with  Professor  Whit- 
ney that  '  it  need  not  be  said  that  the  objections 
brought  on  etymological  and  literary  and  other 
grounds  against  the  correction  of  English  spelling 
are  the  unthinking  expressions  of  ignorance  and 
prejudice.'  If  these  statements  were  true,  the 
reformers  would  have  something  substantial  to 
show  for  their  long-continued  efforts,  and  the 
fact  is  notorious  that  they  have  almost  nothing 
to  show  for  them.  When  we  come  to  think  of 
it,  the  wholesale  ascription  of  '  ignorance  and 
prejudice '  to  the  many  men  who  have  opposed 
the  spelling-mongers  is  a  weapon  more  likely 
than  not  to  recoil  upon  those  who  use  it  as  an 
argument ;  while  '  contemptible  '  is  about  as  ill- 
fitting  an  epithet  as  could  be  found,  whether  to 


Education  215 

describe  the  conservative  position  itself,  or  the 
spelling  which  is  the  primary  object  of  attack. 
Our  English  spelling  may  be  irrational,  and  in- 
consistent, and  difficult  of  mastery,  but  it  is  just 
as  much  a  natural  product  as  is  a  tree  or  a  w^ild 
animal.  One  may  prefer  the  order  and  symmetry 
of  a  French  garden  to  a  free  woodland  growth ; 
but  he  who  has  a  nice  feeling  for  the  meaning 
of  words  does  not  call  the  forest  oak  contempt- 
ible because  it  i^  gnarled. 

An  article  in  '  The  Forum,'  by  Mr.  Benjamin 
E.  Smith,  the  editor  of  '  The  Century  Dic- 
tionary,' quotes  with  seeming  approval  the  above 
dicta  of  Professors  Lounsbury  and  Whitney,  but 
proceeds  to  discuss  the  subject  in  a  very  different 
spirit.  Mr.  Smith  is  a  pronounced  advocate  of 
spelling-reform,  but  he  reckons  with  the  argu- 
ments of  his  opponents  instead  of  brushing  them 
aside  as  unworthy  of  serious  consideration.  The 
conservative  could  ask  for  no  better  statement 
than  the  following  of  the  reason  that  chiefly 
influences  him  in  opposing  any  radical  change. 
This  reason  is  '  the  closely-knit  association,  in 
all  minds,  between  the  form  of  the  printed  word, 
or  of  the  printed  page,  and  the  spiritual  atmos- 


2i6  Editorial  Echoes 

phere  which  breathes  through  our  language  and 
literature.  There  is  a  deep-rooted  feeling  that 
the  existing  printed  form  is  not  only  a  symbol 
but  the  most  fitting  syrnbol  of  our  mother  tongue, 
and  that  a  radical  change  in  this  symbol  must 
inevitably  impair y^r  us  the  beauty  and  spiritual 
effectiveness  of  that  which  it  symbolizes.  Could 
the  literary  spirit  even  of  a  Shakespeare,  we  feel, 
retain  for  us  undiminished  its  delicacy  and  power 
if  clothed  in  the  spelling  of  the  "Fonetic  Nuz"?' 
The  feeling  thus  expressed  is  akin  to  that  which 
makes  us  enjoy  literature  far  more  in  the  pages 
of  a  comely  and  carefully-studied  volume  than 
we  could  enjoy  the  same  work  in  some  cheap  and 
tasteless  reprint.  It  is  the  same  sort  of  feeling 
that  heightens  for  all  readers  of  taste  the  power 
of  literature  when  it  appeals  to  them  from  the 
pages  of  a  Conquet  edition,  or  a  publication  of 
the  Grolier  Club,  or  an  issue  of  the  Kelmscott 
Press.  It  is  useless  to  call  such  feelings  irra- 
tional, or  to  make  light  of  them  as  arguments 
against  a  change ;  they  exist,  and  they  exert  a 
controlling  influence  upon  the  decisions  of  the 
majority  of  intelligent  readers.  Those  who  cannot 
share  them,  and  allow  them  their  full  weight  in. 


Education  217 

the  discussion,  are  as  incompetent  to  pronounce 
judgment  upon  the  question  of  spelling-reform  as 
are  the  color-blind  to  pronounce  upon  Venetian 
painting,  or  those  without  an  ear  for  music  to  pass 
upon  the  achievements  of  Bach  and  Beethoven. 
This  of  course  is  only  one  of  the  reasons  for 
which  a  wholesale  change  in  our  spelling  is  op- 
posed by  so  many  earnest  thinkers.  There  are 
other  weighty  considerations,  such  as  the  danger 
of  making  the  great  mass  of  printed  literature  in 
the  least  degree  difficult  of  access  for  the  average 
reader;  and  the  danger  of  obscuring  etymologies, 
of  which  too  much  has  doubtless  been  made,  but 
which  remains  a  real  danger  in  spite  of  the  many 
efforts  to  minimize  it.  We  must  also  remember 
that  the  arguments  made  in  behalf  of  reform  are 
often  greatly  overstated.  We  are  given  the 
wildest  estimates  of  the  amount  of  money  that 
might  be  saved  in  our  printing  bills,  of  the  num- 
ber of  years  that  might  be  saved  in  the  work  of 
primary  education,  of  the  obstacles  that  might  be 
removed  from  the  path  of  foreign  students  of  our 
language.  All  of  these  arguments  have  weight, 
but  they  do  not  have  anything  like  the  weight 
given  them  by  phonetic  extremists.     Mr.  Smith, 


21 8  Editorial  Echoes 

who  is  not  an  extremist,  discusses  the  whole 
question  with  the  utmost  fairness,  admits  that 
spelling-reform  '  has  made  almost  no  headway  at 
all,'  concedes  '  that  the  adoption  by  the  public  of 
any  general,  radical,  phonetic  system  is  one  of  the 
most  improbable  things  that  can  be  imagined,' 
and  declares  that  the  only  practical  thing  for  the 
reformers  to  attempt  is  a  series  of  gradual  modi- 
fications/«  the  language — stimulating  by  con- 
scious effort  the  sort  of  transformation  that  has 
been  working  itself  out  instinctively  during  the 
past  three  centuries. 

If  spelling-reformers  in  general  would  adopt 
this  moderate  position,  there  would  be  little  serious 
disagreement  among  thinking  men.  Mr.  Horace 
E.  Scudder,  speaking  of  Webster's  unsuccessful 
effort  to  create  a  new  language  '  made  in  Amer- 
ica,' justly  says  :  '  Language  is  not  a  toy  or  patent 
machine,  which  can  be  broken,  thrown  aside  at 
will,  and  replaced  with  a  better  tool,  ready-made 
from  the  lexicographer's  shop.  He  had  no  con- 
ception of  the  enormous  weight  of  the  English 
language  and  literature,  when  he  undertook  to 
shovel  it  out  of  the  path  of  American  civilization. 
The  stars  in  their  courses  fought  against  him.' 


Education  219 

It  may  safely  be  said  that  English  spelling  will 
continue  to  undergo  the  sort  of  modification  in 
the  direction  of  rationality  that  has  marked  its 
development  in  the  past,  and  at  a  probably  accel- 
erated rate.  And  it  may  be  said  with  equal 
safety  that  no  other  sort  of  change  is  possible. 
It  is  our  own  opinion  that  no  other  sort  of  change 
is,  all  things  considered,  desirable,  and  that  each 
simplified  spelling  proposed  must  be  judged  upon 
its  own  merits,  submitting  to  a  test  in  which 
feeling  and  instinct  are  given  as  much  weight  as 
logic,  before  it  shall  receive  permanent  acceptance 
in  our  speech.  '  There  are,'  to  quote  from  Mr. 
Smith  once  more, '  in  the  variations  of  our  existing 
orthography  allowed  by  the  dictionaries  and  in 
the  occasional  innovations  of  influential  writers 
which  are  accepted  by  the  public  without  any 
jarring  of  the  nerves,  the  beginnings  of  a  move- 
ment which,  if  continued  along  its  own  lines  and 
gradually  pushed  to  a  consistent  conclusion,  will 
result  in  a  vast  simplification  and  rationalizing  of 
our  language.' 


IN  MEMORIAM 


In  Memoriam  223 


JOHN  RUSKIN. 

Within  a  few  days  of  the  completion  of  his 
eighty-first  year,  death  crowned  the  labors  of 
John  Ruskin,and  he  entered  the  company  of  the 
immortals.  There  is  no  Englishman  of  his  in- 
tellectual and  moral  stature  left  alive ;  his  peers 
have  all  gone  before  him,  and  the  last  of  the 
great  spirits  who  shaped  for  the  Victorian  age  its 
ethical  and  aesthetical  ideals  has  been  gathered 

to  his  rest. 

«  As  he  willed,  he  worked: 
And,  as  he  worked,  he  wanted  not,  be  sure, 
Triumph  his  whole  life  through,  submitting  work 
To  work's  right  judges,  never  to  the  wrong, 
To  competency,  not  ineptitude.' 

His  life  was  so  complete,  so  filled  with  nianifold 
serviceable  activities,  so  rich  in  the  garner  of 
life's  best  fruits,  that  we  cannot  deplore  his  death, 
however  sincere  our  mourning,  but  must  rather 
be  touched  with  a  deep  solemnity  at  the  thought 
of  what  he  did  and  what  he  was,  mingled  with 
a  deep  gratitude  for  the  example  of  his  consecrated 


224  Editorial  Echoes 

days.      His  work  for  mankind  was  ended  a  full 

decade  ago,  and  the   peaceful   hours  that   were 

given   him   after    his    pen    had    been   laid    aside 

removed  him  so  entirely  from  any  sort  of  contact 

with  the  active  world  that  his  continued  bodily 

presence  among  men  has  been  difficult  to  realize. 

*  The  soul  that's  tutelary  now 
Till  time  end,  o'er  the  world  to  teach  and  bless' 

has  seemed  to  us  hardly  more  than  a  disembodied 
spirit  since  the  year  when  those  '  Praeterita ' 
which  we  were  reading  with  such  eager  interest 
met  with  their  final  interruption,  and  became 
themselves  things  of  that  past  with  which  they 
were  concerned. 

John  Ruskin  was  born  in  London  on  the 
eighth  of  February,  1819.  He  died  on  the 
twentieth  of  January,  1900,  at  his  Lake  Country 
home,  Brantwood,  in  Coniston,  where  something 
like  the  last  score  of  his  years  were  spent.  His 
intellectual  activity  covers  a  period  of  nearly 
sixty  years,  for  his  precocity  was  marked,  and  he 
wrote  creditable  verses  at  the  age  often  or  there- 
abouts. At  fifteen  we  find  him  contributing  to  a 
periodical  of  popular  science  papers  with  such 
titles  as  '  Enquiries  on  the  Causes  of  the  Color 


In  Memoriam  225 

of  the  Water  of  the  Rhine '  and  ^  Facts  and 
Considerations  on  the  Strata  of  Mont  Blanc' 
From  this  time  until  his  physical  breakdown  at 
the  age  of  seventy,  there  is  no  year  that  does  not 
add  its  title  or  titles  to  the  bibliography  of  his 
writings,  the  mere  list  of  which,  without  comment, 
would  nearly,  if  not  quite,  fill  up  all  the  space 
here  at  our  command.  And  what  memories 
these  titles  evoke  in  the  minds  of  men  and  women 
to  whom  the  message  of  Ruskin  has  come  as  a 
veritable  new  gospel  of  beauty  and  the  conduct 
of  life !  They  think  of  '  Modern  Painters,' 
'  The  Stones  of  Venice,'  ^  The  Seven  Lamps  of 
Architecture,'  and  recall  the  quickened  vision, 
the  new  appreciation,  the  deepened  insight,  which 
the  reading  of  these  books  has  brought  them 
when  viewing  the  cities  and  the  galleries  of 
Europe.  They  think  of  '  Sesame  and  Lilies ' 
and  '  The  Queen  of  the  Air,'  and  recall  the 
stimulus  and  the  fresh  inspiration  that  these  books 
have  brought  to  the  study  of  literature.  They 
think  of  '  The  Crown  of  Wild  Olive  '  and  '  The 
Ethics  of  the  Dust,'  and  recall  their  realization 
of  the  unity  of  truth  and  goodness  and  beauty, 
their  first  sense  of  the  fashion  in  which  the  cul- 

15 


226  Editorial  Echoes 

tivated  intelligence  apprehends  the  most  diverse 
of  phenomena  as  related  to  the  same  central  set 
of  ideals,  in  thought  welding  beauty  to  utility, 
and  art  to  the  practical  conduct  of  life.  They 
think  of  ^Munera  Pulveris  '  and  'Unto  This 
Last/  and  recall  the  heightened  sense  of  social 
solidarity  which  they  derived  frotn  these  books, 
the  view  of  human  intercourse  as  a  complex  of 
mutual  obligations,  the  doctrine  of  duties  applied 
as  a  corrective  to  the  doctrine  of  rights.  Finally, 
they  think  of  '  Fors  Clavigera  '  and  '  Praeterita,' 
and  recall  the  unselfish  character  and  single- 
hearted  devotion  to  the  service  of  humanity  which 
these  books  so  unconsciously  portray,  while  love 
and  reverence  for  the  writer  become  blended 
into  one  emotion  of  thankfulness  for  all  of  his 
gifts  to  mankind,  the  most  precious  of  them  all 
being  the  gift  of  himself. 

Ruskin's  career  has  two  well-defined  periods. 
During  the  first,  he  was  essentially  a  teacher  of 
art;  during  the  second,  he  was  essentially  a  teach- 
er of  ethics.  The  year  i860  marks  the  grand 
climacteric  of  his  life,  for  it  saw  the  completion 
of  '  Modern  Painters  '  and  the  inauguration,  with 
'  Unto  this  Last,'  of  the  long  series  of  the  writ- 


In  Memoriam  227 

ings  which  are  concerned  with  men  in  their  social 
relations.  When  the  turning-point  was  reached, 
he  was  about  forty  years  of  age,  he  had  become 
the  foremost  writer  of  his  time  upon  the  subject 
of  the  fine  arts,  he  had  forced  an  unwilling  public 
to  recognize  the  genius  of  the  great  landscape 
painter  of  England,  he  had  become  the  inter- 
preter of  Giotto,  and  Tintoretto,  and  many  other 
great  artists  hitherto  imperfectly  appreciated  or 
not  at  all,  he  had  espoused  the  cause  of  the  Pre- 
Raphaelites,  given  effective  aid  to  their  propa- 
ganda, and  had  befriended  them  individually  when 
help  was  most  grateful,  he  had  made  himself  one 
of  the  greatest  masters  of  English  prose,  thereby 
increasing  tenfold  his  influence  as  a  critic  of  art, 
he  had,  finally,  been  called  upon  to  bear  his  por- 
tion of  the  private  grief  which  is  the  common  lot 
of  men,  and  the  brief  chapter  of  his  domestic 
happiness  had  come  to  an  end.  His  work  done 
in  the  field  of  art  criticism  has  called  forth  an 
enormous  amount  of  discussion,  in  the  form  of 
both  approval  and  dissent.  At  first,  his  opinions 
excited  violent  antagonism ;  then,  for  a  period,  the 
force  of  his  eloquence  seemed  to  carry  everything 
before  it ;  then,  again,  a  marked  reaction  set  in, 


228  Editorial  Echoes 

and  a  deliberate  effort  was  made  to  belittle  his 
achievements  and  minimize  his  influence.  We  do 
not  think  that  the  two  parties  to  this  controversy 
have  ever  joined  issue  fairly  and  squarely.  We 
may  allow  the  justice  of  much  that  has  been  said 
by  his  hostile  critics,  —  by  Mr.  Stillman,  for  ex- 
ample, and  Dr.  Waldstein,  —  yet  admit  almost  to 
the  full  what  has  been  claimed  for  him  by  the 
most  earnest  of  his  champions.  Both  parties  are 
right,  in  some  sense.  For  the  attack,  we  may 
say  that  his  specific  judgments  were  often  wrong, 
that  his  bestowal  of  praise  was  exaggerated  be- 
yond all  reason,  that  his  advice  to  painters  was 
frequently  impracticable,  and  that  his  influence 
upon  contemporary  artists  was  slight.  But  for 
the  defence  we  must  also  say  something.  We 
must  say,  for  example,  that  he  made  the  general 
English  public  think  more  seriously  about  art 
than  it  had  ever  done  before.  We  must  say  that 
his  writings  opened  eyes  by  the  thousands  that 
had  hitherto  been  blind,  and,  if  those  eyes  did 
not  see  just  what  he  would  have  had  them  see, 
they  were  at  least  opened  to  some  kind  of  truth 
that  would  not  have  been  revealed  to  them  at  all 
except  for  his  influence.      We  must  say,  also. 


In  Memoriam  229 

that  he  gave  to  the  pursuit  and  study  of  art  a  dig- 
nity that  it  had  never  known  before,  by  virtue  of 
his  constant  insistence  upon  the  relation  of  art  to 
morality,  his  unalterable  determination  to  judge 
of  artistic  work  from  other  standpoints  than  the 
narrow  one  of  technique,  and  the  prophetic  fer- 
vor with  which  he  proclaimed  the  gospel,  not  of 
art  for  art's  sake,  but  of  art  for  the  sake  of  man's 
temporal  delight  and  eternal  salvation. 

The  change  that  came  over  the  complexion 
of  Ruskin's  thought  in  his  early  forties  was  very 
marked.  He  had  outgrown  the  narrowness  of 
his  early  beliefs,  his  sympathies  had  broadened, 
he  had  learned  that  life  was  more  than  art,  he 
had  resolved  to  do  what  he  might  to  bring  prac- 
tical counsel  and  effective  help  to  his  fellow-men. 
At  first,  and  for  ten  years  or  thereabouts,  he 
confined  himself  for  the  most  part  to  his  writings, 
which  soon  acquired  for  themselves  a  range  that 
they  had  not  known  before ;  then,  with  the 
fortune  which  had  come  to  him  upon  the  death 
of  his  father,  and  which  he  felt  that  he  was  to 
hold  in  trust  only,  he  set  about  doing  things ;  he 
began  the  publication  of  the  '  Fors  Clavigera,' 
and  instituted  the  Guild  of  St.  George.     In  the 


230  Editorial  Echoes 

first  letter  of  '  Fors/   he   thus   stated   his   pro- 
gramme in  general  terms  : 

*I  am  not  an  unselfish  person,  nor  an  Evangelical 
oncj  I  have  no  particular  pleasure  in  doing  goodj  neither 
do  I  dislike  doing  it  so  much  as  to  expect  to  be  rewarded 
for  it  in  another  world.  But  I  simply  cannot  paint,  nor 
read,  nor  look  at  minerals,  nor  do  anything  else  that  I 
like,  and  the  very  light  of  the  morning  sky,  when  there 
is  any  —  which  is  seldom,  now-a-days,  near  London  — 
has  become  hateful  to  me,  because  of  the  misery  that  I 
know  of,  and  see  signs  of,  where  I  know  it  not,  which 
no  imagination  can  interpret  too  bitterly.  Therefore, 
as  I  have  said,  I  will  endure  it  no  longer  quietly j  but 
henceforward,  with  any  few  or  many  who  will  help,  do 
my  poor  best  to  abate  this  misery." 

That  so  radical  a  programme  as  Ruskin  marked 
out  for  his  declining  years  was  foredoomed  to 
failure,  as  far  as  practical  outcome  was  con- 
cerned, must  have  appeared  manifest  to  any 
temperate  observer.  He  sought  to  reconstruct 
English  society,  to  counteract  the  combined 
forces  of  democratic  impulse  and  economic  law, 
to  restore  to  the  nineteenth  century  the  ideals  of 
the  thirteenth.  A  few  only  of  the  items  in  this 
programme  may  be  specified.  Railways  were  to 
be  done  away  with,  and  labor-saving  machinery 
abandoned.  The  taking  of  interest  was  to  be 
held  sinful,  and  the  regime  of  status  was  to  re- 


In  Memoriam  231 

place  the  regime  of  contract.  Individual  impulse 
was  to  be  suppressed  by  the  weight  of  a  restored 
social  hierarchy.  The  whole  system  of  popular 
education  was  to  be  made  over  upon  essentially 
mediaeval  lines.  These  things,  and  many  more 
like  unto  them,  were  urged  with  all  the  ingenuity 
of  argument  and  eloquence  of  appeal  at  the 
author's  command,  and,  as  far  as  might  be,  he 
put  these  things  into  practical  effect  in  his  own 
life,  and  in  the  lives  of  those  over  whom  he  had 
any  sort  of  control. 

No  summary  in  the  bare  outline  form  just 
attempted  is  really  fair  to  Ruskin.  The  stupen-* 
dous  wrongheadedness  of  such  a  programme,  so 
stated,  merely  repels,  and  we  would  not  repel  a 
single  possible  reader  from  even  the  most  prac- 
tically impossible  of  the  books  wherein  the  parts 
of  this  programme  are  set  forth.  The  attitude 
of  the  sane  intelligence  toward  these  teachings 
is  expressed  by  Mr.  Frederic  Harrison  when  he 
says :  '  In  one  sense,  no  doubt,  I  stand  at  an 
opposite  pole  of  ideas,  and  in  literal  and  direct 
words,  I  could  hardly  adopt  any  one  of  the  lead- 
ing doctrines  of  his  creed.  As  to  mine,  he 
probably  rejects  everything  I  hold   sacred   and 


232  Editorial  Echoes 

true  with  violent  indignation  and  scorn.'  'Yet 
in  spite  of  this  divergence  of  positive  belief,  Mr. 
Harrison  has  made  the  author  the  subject  of  one 
of  the  most  glowing  panegyrics  ever  penned,  and 
he  expresses  what  we  believe  will  remain  the 
deliberate  judgment  of  mankind  when  he  goes 
on  to  speak  in  the  following  strain  : 

*  Some  day,  perhaps,  a  future  generation  will  be  able 
to  take  up  these  outpourings  of  the  spirit,  not  to  criticise 
and  condemn  what  they  find  there  to  dispute  or  to  laugh 
at,* but  in  the  way  in  which  sensible  men  read  Plato's 
<*  Republic,''  or  the  book  of  Ezekiel,  or  Dante's  <<Vita 
Nuova,'*  to  enjoy  the  melody  of  the  language,  the  in- 
spiring poetry,  and  their  apocalyptic  visions,  without 
being  disturbed  in  the  least  by  all  that  is  mystical,  fan- 
tastical, impossible  in  the  ideal  of  humanity  they  present.' 

In  a  word,  the  balance  of  Ruskin's  teachings, 
whatever  specific  vagaries  they  may  embody, 
will  rest  upon  the  side  of  progress,  of  ethical 
inspiration,  of  worthy  human  activity,  of  all  that 
is  desirable  for  the  uplifting  of  the  race.  In  this 
belief,  we  would  earnestly  recommend  the  most 
extreme  of  his  books,  even  '  Unto  this  Last,' 
and  the  many  volumes  of  the  '  Fors  Clavigera,' 
not  indeed  as  the  best  food  for  untrained  minds, 
but  as  a  helpful  influence  to  the  cultivated  intel- 
ligence, as  a  needed  corrective  for  all   that  is 


In  Memoriam  233 

unspirltual  and  materialistic  In  the  thought  of 
the  age.  Their  essential  teaching  Is  at  one  with 
that  of  the  great  leaders  of  man's  ethical  and 
religious  thought,  and  their  perversity  of  utter- 
ance no  more  than  an  accident  powerless  to 
work  lasting  injury.  The  gift  of  communion 
with  such  a  spirit  Is  one  of  the  most  precious 
that  literature  can  offer,  and  a  deep  sense  of 
gratitude,  of  reverent  affection.  Is  what  remains 
to  us  unshaken,  after  all  possible  exceptions  have 
been  taken,  after  all  needful  allowances  have 
been  made,  when  we  think  of  the  great  work 
and  the  noble  life  that  ended  In  the  closing  year 
of  the  century  to  which  they  lent  so  Imperishable 
a  lustre. 


234  Editorial  Echoes 


WILLIAM   EWART  GLADSTONE. 

It  Is  not  often  that  the  closing  days  of  a  great 
career  compel  the  grief  and  sympathy  of  the 
whole  civilized  world.  There  are  so  many  great 
men  in  so  many  departments  of  human  activity, 
while  the  interests  of  observers  are  so  specialized 
and  varied,  that  one  must  occupy  an  extraordi- 
narily commanding  position  to  exact  from  all 
classes  the  tribute  of  attention,  even  under  cir- 
cumstances that  make  unusual  demands  upon  the 
sympathies.  That  something  like  this  triumph 
was  achieved  by  Mr.  Gladstone  is  evident  from 
the  widespread  eagerness  with  which  the  course 
of  his  fatal  disease,  and  the  pathetic  sufferings 
attendant  upon  it,  were  followed  by  all  kinds  of 
readers,  and  the  abundance  of  eulogy  that  was 
set  free  by  the  news  of  his  final  release.  The 
last  remaining  member  of  the  remarkable  group 
of  men  fortuitously  associated  by.  the  year  of 
their  common  birth,  his  popular  renown  was 
perhaps  greater  than  that  of  any  of  the  others. 


In  Memoriam  235 

although  it  may  hardly  be  doubted  that  the  verdict 
of  '  them  who  know/  as  registered  by  the  posterity 
of  the  twentieth  century,  will  assign  to  Lincoln 
a  higher  place  in  the  making  of  history,  to  Ten- 
nyson and  Darwin  higher  places  in  the  develop- 
ment of  thought.  But  at  the  time  of  his  death 
we  were  so  impressed  with  the  towering  person- 
ality of  the  English  statesman,  and  felt  so  keenly 
the  loss  of  his  leadership,  that  the  critical  sense 
became  deadened,  and  the  temptation  was  well- 
nigh  irresistible  to  join  in  the  journalistic  chorus 
of  praise  in  which  his  life-work  was  reviewed. 
To  the  critic  determined  upon  unrelieved 
eulogy  there  is,  indeed,  in  the  career  of  Glad- 
stone material  enough  to  inspire  the  most  slug- 
gish to  panegyric,  achievement  to  the  credit  of 
the  man  himself  and  to  humanity  at  large  suf- 
ficient to  give  pause  to  the  voice  of  detraction 
and  permit  the  laurel-wreath  of  fame  to  rest 
unquestioned  upon  his  brow.  The  memory  of 
his  eloquence,  the  devotion  inspired  by  his  lead- 
ership, his  splendid  humanitarian  endeavor  in 
behalf  of  oppressed  peoples,  his  unexampled 
mastery  of  financial  and  other  administrative 
problems,  his  instinct  for  righteousness  in  both 


236  Editorial  Echoes 

public  and  private  life,  his  unswerving  devotion 
to  the  ideals  which  seemed  to  him  worthy,  how- 
ever mistaken  some  of  them  may  have  been,  his 
almost  complete  exemption  from  the  human 
failings  that  so  often  add  a  touch  of  pettiness  to 
the  lives  of  the  most  exalted,  —  all  these  things 
ofFer  the  strongest  possible  temptation  to  deal 
with  his  mernory  in  the  spirit  of  the  old  adage 
that  bids  us  speak  nothing  but  good  concerning 
the  dead.  In  this  case,  at  least,  there  is  no 
danger  of  providing  a  new  illustration  of  the 
Shakespearian  lines, — 

<The  evil  that  men  do  lives  after  thern, 
The  good  is  oft  interred  with  their  bones.' 

The  danger  is  rather  that  eulogy  will  become  so 
indiscriminate  as  to  make  claims  for  Gladstone 
that  cannot  possibly  be  justified,  that  his  intel- 
lectual defects  will  be  for  the  time  forgotten  in 
the  generous  glow  of  feeling  with  which  his 
career  is  commemorated. 

The  public  life  of  Gladstone  will  receive  its 
final  appraisement  from  the  impartial  historian 
far  on  in  the  coming  century.  It  is  safe  to  say 
that  this  appraisement  will  be  far  removed  from 
the  laudatory  extreme  of  the  present  day  when 


In  Memoriam  237 

the  sense  of  his  loss  is  fresh  in  our  hearts,  and 
from  the  extreme  of  dispraise  which  his  famous 
volte-face  of  1 886  then  evoked  from  most  of  the 
men  among  his  contemporaries  where  opinions 
had  real  weight.  That  his  plan  for  the  settle- 
ment of  the  Irish  agitation  would,  if  successfully 
carried  out,  have  sown  the  seeds  of  disintegration 
in  the  Constitution  of  the  United  Kingdom,  we 
firmly  believe;  but  the  violence  with  which  he 
was  assailed  for  his  advocacy  of  that  plan,  and 
the  passionate  way  in  which  his  motives  were 
then  impugned,  did  little  credit  to  his  opponents, 
and  afforded  a  melancholy  illustration  of  the  ex- 
tremes to  which  the  partisan  spirit  may  pervert 
the  judgment.  The  degree  and  quality  of  Glad- 
stone's statesmanship  remain  yet  to  be  weighed 
in  the  impartial  scales  of  dispassionate  criticism ; 
and  this  it  is  no  more  possible  to  do  at  the  present 
time  than  it  would  have  been  fifteen  years  ago, 
for  the  balance  which  would  then  have  tipped  far 
too  much  on  the  one  side  would  just  now  incline 
far  too  much  upon  the  other.  Meanwhile,  we 
may  express  the  opinion  that  the  estimate  made 
by  Matthew  Arnold  not  long  before  the  death 
of  that  writer,  published  in  one  of  the  reviews. 


238  Editorial  Echoes 

will  in  the  end  prove  to  have  come  as  near  as 
any  contemporary  estimate  to  the  judgment  of 
posterity.  It  has  been  too  much  the  fashion  to 
speak  slightingly  of  Arnold's  judgment  in  extra- 
literary  matters,  but  his  memory  will  in  time 
come  to  its  own  in  this  regard,  and  it  will  be 
understood  upon  how  many  matters  of  political 
and  religious  significance  he  held  the  scales  of 
even-handed  justice. 

The  twentieth  century  will  not  find  it  alto- 
gether easy  to  account  for  Gladstone's  hold  upon 
the  nineteenth  century.  It  will  have  to  accept 
the  fact  as  unquestionable,  but  the  explanation 
will  prove  puzzling.  He  will  be  remembered  as 
a  Great  Commoner,  somewhat  as  the  elder  Pitt 
is  now  remembered,  and  men  will  turn  to  his 
speeches  to  penetrate  the  secret  of  his  power. 
But  in  those  speeches  they  will  find  little  to  re- 
mind them  of  the  eloquence  with  which  Pitt 
appeals  to  us  even  now  from  the  printed  page. 
They  will  find,  rather,  a  difi*use  and  common 
style,  often  weighty  in  matter,  but  without  wings 
to  soar.  The  irony  of  the  familiar  phrase,  litera 
scripta  manet^  will  be  deeply  felt  when  these  dull 
periods  are  contrasted  with  the  tradition  of  their 


In  Memoriam  239 

framer's  eloquence.  For  Gladstone  was,  beyond 
doubt,  one  of  the  most  eloquent  speakers  who 
have  ever  moved  legislatures.  But  to  the  student 
of  a  hundred  years  from  now,  while  the  written 
word  will  indeed  remain  for  his  examination,  the 
moral  fervor  that  made  the  word  vital  when 
spoken  will  have  been  long  since  chilled,  and 
the  personality  that  made  the  word  impressive 
will  have  become  but  a  dim  memory.  How 
marked  is  the  contrast  between  the  case  of  Glad- 
stone and  the  case  of  Burke.  The  ineffectual 
oratory  of  the  eighteenth-century  statesman  had 
no  charm  for  the  sense,  but  the  speeches  that  he 
delivered  to  empty  benches  have  taken  their 
place  for  all  time  in  the  literature  of  the  world. 
Delivered  to  inattentive  ears,  the  depth  of  their 
political  wisdom  and  the  gorgeous  embroidery  of 
their  style  have  made  them  an  inexhaustible 
source  of  inspiration  to  all  succeeding  genera- 
tions. The  speeches  of  Gladstone,  on  the  other 
hand,  for  half  a  century  compelled  the  attention 
of  crowds  of  eager  listeners,  but  their  power  to 
sway  died  with  the  breath  that  gave  them  life, 
and  the  statesman  of  the  future  will  turn  to  them 
neither  for  guidance  nor  for  inspiration. 


240  Editorial  Echoes 

What  is  true  of  Gladstone's  speeches  consid- 
ered as  literary  productions  is  also  true  of  the 
great  mass  of  other  printed  material  furnished 
forth  by  his  busy  pen.  It  is  with  regard  to  this 
phase  of  his  activity  more  than  any  other  that 
the  day-laborers  of  the  press,  as  Schopenhauer 
calls  journalists,  have  shown  a  total  lack  of  crit- 
ical discrimination.  They  have  simply  taken  for 
granted  that  so  great  a  man  must  be  great  in 
whatever  he  undertakes,  and  have  entertained 
and  spread  abroad  —  honestly  enough,  no  doubt 
—  the  notion  that  Gladstone  was  a  distinguished 
writer  and  a  profound  thinker.  Nothing  could 
be  farther  removed  from  the  truth  than  this 
opinion.  One  may  search  his  voluminous  writ- 
ings in  vain  for  anything  like  high  distinction  in 
expression,  while  scholars  in  most  of  the  special 
fields  into  which  he  sometimes  made  excursions 
have  almost  always  refused  to  take  him  seriously. 
When  they  were  occasionally  persuaded  so  to 
take  him,  as  in  the  case  of  his  famous  contro- 
versy with  Huxley,  the  result  was  much  to  his 
discomfiture.  He  was  hardly  more  fortunate  in 
his  Homeric  studies  than  in  his  championship  of 
an  old-fashioned  theology  against  natural  science 


In  Memoriam  241 

and  the  higher  criticism.  He  possessed  a  vast 
store  of  minute  information  upon  historical  and 
ecclesiastical  subjects,  but  even  the  great  length 
of  his  years  did  not  bring  the  philosophic  mind 
in  the  best  sense,  and  he  always  displayed  an  ex- 
traordinary instinct  for  the  exploration  of  '  bHnd 
leads '  in  theological  and  humanistic  discussion. 
These  diversions  of  his  literary  activity,  as  dis- 
tinguished from  his  really  sohd  work  in  the  fields 
of  financial,  administrative,  and  political  science, 
are  for  the  most  part  hopelessly  futile ;  they  have 
produced  no  more  than  a  few  ripples  in  the  cur- 
rent of  serious  thought,  and  they  have  no  anti- 
septic of  style  to  protect  them  from  decay. 

A  man  who  wrote  so  much  as  Gladstone,  yet 
in  his  writing  could  never  attain  to  any  higher 
literary  qualities  than  a  certain  sincerity  of  pur- 
pose and  quiet  dignity,  whose  manner  was  ha- 
bitually diffuse  and  frequently  commonplace, 
could  hardly  be  expected  to  display  a  delicate 
critical  sense  in  dealing  with  literature  in  general. 
Omnivorous  reader  that  he  was,  it  was  evidently 
the  matter  of  books  that  he  prized  rather  than 
the  form  of  its  expression.  One  never  knew 
what   kind  of  a  new  book   would   receive   his 

16 


242  Editorial  Echoes 

approval,  and  be  launched  upon  the  sea  of  an 
ephemeral  fame  by  one  of  his  famous  post-cards. 
He  never  outgrew  the  didactic  ideal  of  literature, 
and  the  didacticism  of  a  book,  in  order  to  win 
his  favor,  must  conform  pretty  closely  to  a  rather 
narrow  set  of  traditional  lines.  Poetry,  to  be 
really  great,  must  have  fairly  definite  religious 
implications,  and  the  norm  of  these  implications 
must  not  depart  very  far  from  the  standards  of 
the  Church  of  England.  His  interest  in  the 
Homeric  epic,  for  example,  derived  much  of  its 
strength  from  fancied  analogies  between  the 
Hellenic  and  Hebraic  ideals,  and  he  displayed  all 
his  ingenuity  in  seeking  to  establish  such  a  syn- 
thesis. A  typical  passage  from  one  of  his  essays 
speaks  of  '  the  solid  and  consistent  wisdom  which 
can  feel  no  other  firm  foundation  in  the  heart  of 
man  than  the  Gospel  Revelation,  without  which, 
even  while  we  feel  the  poet  to  be  an  enchanter, 
we  cannot  accept  and  trust  him  as  a  guide ;  and 
of  which  Wordsworth  is  an  example  unequaled 
probably  in  our  age  and  unsurpassed  in  any  age 
preceding  ours.'  Gladstone's  essential  attitude 
toward  literature  is  expressed,  and  its  limitations 
clearly  emphasized,  in  the  words  above  quoted, 


In  Memoriam  243 

and  in  the  elaboration  of  their  thought  which 
follows. 

<  The  highest  functions  of  the  human  being  stand  in 
such  intimate  relations  to  one  another  that  the  patent 
want  of  any  one  of  them  will  commonly  prevent  the 
attainment  of  perfection  in  any  other.  The  sense  of 
beauty  enters  into  the  highest  philosophy,  as  in  Plato. 
The  highest  poet  must  be  a  philosopher,  accomplished 
like  Dante,  or  intuitive  like  Shakespeare.  But  neither 
the  one  nor  the  other  can  now  exist  in  separation  from 
that  conception  of  the  relations  between  God  and  man, 
that  new  standard  and  pattern  of  humanity,  which  Chris- 
tianity has  supplied.  It  is  true,  indeed,  that  much  of 
what  it  has  indelibly  impressed  upon  the  imagination  and 
understanding,  the  heart  and  life  of  man,  may  be  traceable 
and  even  prominent  In  those  who  individually  disown  it. 
The  splendor  of  these  disappropriate  gifts  In  particular 
cases  may  be  among  the  very  greatest  of  the  signs  and 
wonders  appointed  for  the  trial  of  faith.  Yet  there  Is 
always  something  in  them  to  show  that  they  have  with 
them  no  source  of  positive  permanent  vitality^  that  the 
branch  has  been  torn  from  the  tree,  and  that  its  life  is  on 
the  wane.* 


244  Editorial  Echoes 


FREDERICK   MAX  MULLER. 

The  death  of  Max  Miiller  brought  up  again  the 
old  question  concerning  the  importance  of  the 
popularizer  as  an  agent  for  the  advancement  of 
science,  and  set  once  more  in  sharp  contrast  the 
attitudes  respectively  assumed  toward  such  a  man 
by  the  reading  public  and  the  body  of  quiet 
scientific  workers.  Max  Miiller,  like  Renan, 
Froude,  Huxley,  and  Tyndall  —  to  name  only  a 
few  of  his  famous  contemporaries  —  had  in  pre- 
eminent degree  the  gift  of  style,  the  charm  of 
graceful  literary  art,  and  the  power  to  interest 
ordinary  minds  in  subjects  not  easily  forced  upon 
their  attention.  This  was  at  once  his  bane  as  a 
scholar  and  the  secret  of  his  popular  success. 
Transferring  our  attention  for  a  moment  from 
the  individual  to  the  group  which  he  so  typically 
illustrated,  we  must  say  that  the  attitude  toward 
such  men  of  those  critics  who  stand  for  the 
methods  of  pure  science  is  apt  to  be  very  un- 
gracious, being  compounded  of  no  small  amount 


In  Memoriam  245 

of  intellectual  arrogance,  and  even  of  envy, 
mingled  with  the  more  legitimate  elements  that 
derive  from  the  sense  of  superior  knowledge  and 
firmer  hold  upon  the  facts.  In  the  view  of  the 
extremer  devotees  of  pure  science,  it  becomes  a 
misdemeanor  to  write  attractively,  and  a  felony 
to  achieve  popularity  with  the  laity.  Sometimes, 
as  was  notably  true  in  the  case  of  Renan,  the 
offence  is  reckoned  so  great  that  the  offender 
receives  only  the  most  grudging  sort  of  recog- 
nition from  his  fellow-workers  in  the  same  field, 
although  in  their  hearts  they  are  conscious  that 
he  stands  abreast  of  the  strongest  of  them,  even 
when  judged  by  the  most  exacting  standards. 
He  has  ventured  to  be  popular,  and  the  fact  that 
he  has  remained  rigorously  scientific  does  not 
remove  the  stigma  in  the  eyes  of  those  self- 
constituted  guardians  of  scholarship. 

Max  Miiller  was  far  from  being  a  philologist 
and  a  student  of  comparative  religion  in  the  sense 
in  which  Renan  was  both,  and  his  intellectual 
armor  was  doubtless  vulnerable  at  many  points ; 
nevertheless,  it  is  unquestionably  true  that  he 
accomplished  much  work  of  solid  value,  and 
deserved  well  of  science  for  his  services.     That 


246  Editorial  Echoes 

science,  especially  as  represented  by  the  younger 
school  of  men  trained  at  the  German  universities, 
has  done  him  something  less  than  justice,  is  a 
fact  that  must  be  admitted  by  the  impartial  ob- 
server. If  he  failed  in  accuracy  of  knowledge, 
if  he  could  not  overcome  certain  intellectual 
prejudices,  if  he  did  not  keep  abreast  of  the 
scholarship  of  his  time,  his  was  still  a  larger  per- 
sonality than  that  of  many  a  critic  who  assailed 
him,  and  who,  without  one-tenth  of  his  actual 
accomplishment,  affected  to  hold  his  authority 
beneath  serious  consideration. 

Max  Miiller  was  born  in  Dessau  in  1823,  ^"^ 
was  a  son  of  the  poet  Wilhelm  Miiller.  The 
artistic  temperament  which  was  thus  his  birth- 
right came  near  to  making  of  him  a  musician 
instead  of  a  scholar,  and  resulted  in  at  least  one 
piece  of  purely  literary  composition,  the  '  Deut- 
sche Liebe '  of  his  youth,  an  exquisite  bit  of 
refined  sentimentalism  long  familiar  to  English 
readers  in  the  translation  entitled  ^  Memories.' 
He  studied  Sanskrit  at  Leipzig,  and  translated 
the  '  Hitopadesa '  at  the  age  of  twenty-one. 
Continuing  his  Sanskrit  studies  under  Bopp  and 
Burnouf,  he  went  to  England  in  1846  for  the 


In  Memoriam  247 

purpose  of  editing  the  '  Rig-Veda,'  a  commission 
given  him  by  the  East  India  Company.  This 
great  undertaking,  which  was,  however,  in  con- 
siderable part  performed  by  another  hand,  occu- 
pied him  largely  for  nearly  thirty  years,  the  last 
of  the  six  volumes  being  dated  as  late  as  1874. 
He  made  his  home  at  Oxford,  and  became  suc- 
cessively a  member,  a  fellow,  a  sub-librarian, 
and  a  professor  of  the  University.  In  1875,  he 
practically  resigned  his  chair,  and  gave  his  chief 
attention  to  the  work  of  editing  '  The  Sacred 
Books  of  the  East,'  a  series  that  eventually 
numbered  thirty  or  forty  volumes.  Among  the 
almost  innumerable  publications  of  his  busy  half- 
century  of  writing,  mention  should  be  made  of 
his  '  Lectures  on  the  Science  of  Language,' 
his  '  Chips  from  a  German  Workshop,'  his 
'  History  of  Sanskrit  Literature,'  his  Hibbert 
lectures  on  '  The  Origin  and  Growth  of  Relig- 
ions,' and  his  '  Science  of  Thought.'  Nor  should 
we  fail  to  include  in  this  list  the  translation  of 
Kant's  '  Kritik  der  Reinen  Vernunft,'  which  he 
made  upon  the  occasion  of  the  centenary  of  that 
great  work,  and  which  is  so  significant  of  his 
constant  adherence  to  the  Kantian  system  and 


248  Editorial  Echoes 

the  Kantian  method  of  envisaging  philosophical 
problems.  His  fifty  and  more  years  of  Oxford 
life  were  comparatively  uneventful,  save  for  the 
delivery  of  his  lectures,  the  publication  of  his 
books,  and  the  honors  bestowed  upon  him  by 
potentates  and  by  learned  societies.  Strange  to 
say,  this  life-long  student  of  Indian  thought  and 
language  never  visited  the  land  which  engaged 
so  large  a  share  of  his  attention.  He  was  one 
of  the  most  famous  of  Orientalists,  but  he  never 
set  foot  in  an  Oriental  country. 

Miiller  rode  his  hobbies  very  hard,  and  per- 
haps the  hardest  ridden  of  them  all  was  his  way 
of  accounting  for  mythology  as  a  disease  of  lan- 
guage. Finding  the  names  of  the  Greek  and 
Hindu  deities  to  be  words  traceable  to  the  phe- 
nomena of  nature, —  the  sun,  the  sky,  and  the 
clouds, —  he  theorized  to  the  effect  that  all  myth- 
ology resulted  from  primitive  descriptions  of  nat- 
ural objects,  the  sense  in  which  the  words  were 
used  gradually  becoming  modified  into  meta- 
phorical meanings,  until  the  literal  signification 
of  the  terms  had  been  quite  forgotten.  This 
seemed  to  be  a  key  that  would  fit  almost  any  of 
the  locks  of  folklore  and  popular  theology,  and 


In  Memoriam  249 

with  it  he  sought  to  reveal  the  innermost  secrets 
of  the  classical  and  Oriental  cosmogonies.  It 
was  a  very  popular  theory  a  generation  ago,  and 
had  things  its  own  way  with  the  general  public. 
It  was  so  easy,  and  at  the  same  time  so  pleasing 
to  the  poetic  sense,  to  reduce  every  primitive 
belief  to  some  variation  of  the  omnipresent  solar 
myth  that  readers  were  quite  captivated  by  the 
notion.  But  the  thing  was  overdone,  and  a  sense 
of  humor  began  to  exert  its  corrosive  action  upon 
this  too  pleasing  theory,  until  solar  myths  lost 
their  favor,  and  few  are  now  so  poor  as  to  do 
them  reverence. 

Miiller  had  many  quarrels  and  controversies 
in  his  special  field  of  Sanskrit,  and  in  the  wider 
field  of  comparative  philology,  but  these  need 
not  concern  us  here.  His  one  great  quarrel  with 
modern  scientific  thought  was  based  upon  his 
view  of  the  origin  of  human  speech.  During 
the  sixties  and  seventies,  when  Darwinism  was 
having  pretty  much  its  own  way  with  most 
classes  of  thinkers,  from  naturalists  to  philos- 
ophers, it  encountered  what  seemed  to  be  a  very 
ugly  snag  in  the  opposition  of  Miiller,  based 
upon  strictly  philological  grounds.  The  theory  of 


250  Editorial  Echoes 

evolution  seemed  to  offer  no  way  of  accounting 
for  the  beginning  of  intelligible  speech,  and 
although  Darwinians  were  convinced  that  this 
difficulty  could  not  be  a  real  one,  they  were 
nevertheless  put  to  their  wits'  ends  to  deal  with 
it  as  it  was  presented  in  Miiller's  cogent  argu- 
ment. The  process  of  development,  he  said, 
could  readily  enough  be  traced  back  to  the  roots 
of  a  language,  but  there  it  seemed  to  stick.  The 
Aryan  roots  were  perfectly  definite  symbols  for 
definite  concepts,  and  they  seemed  to  have  no 
reasonably  imaginable  antecedents.  '  There  they 
are,  gentlemen,'  he  said  in  substance,  '  and  what 
are  you  going  to  do  about  it  ? '  The  '  bow-wow  ' 
theory,  which  ascribed  to  them  an  onomatopoetic 
character,  was  too  childish  for  serious  considera- 
tion, and  the  '  pooh-pooh '  theory,  which  sought 
to  explain  them  as  the  primitive  symbols  of  emo- 
tional conditions,  was  quite  inadequate  to  account 
for  them.  During  his  later  years,  Miiller  him- 
self seemed  to  feel  that  his  negative  attitude 
toward  the  most  pregnant  conception  of  modern 
philosophy  was  hardly  becoming  a  man  of  science, 
and  he  came  to  realize  that  the  mere  lack  of  a 
reasonable  theory  of  the  origin  of  language  was 


In  Memoriam  251 

not  enough  to  make  men  believe  that  it  had  no 
rational  origin.  His  own  view  became  consider- 
ably modified  by  the  speculations  of  Professor 
Noire,  and  he  accepted  the  'yo-heave-ho'  theory, 
which  accounted  for  the  mysterious  roots  as  a 
product  of  the  clamor  concomitans  of  men  engaged 
in  common  labor,  as  providing  at  least  a  provis- 
ional method  for  the  solution  of  the  problem. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  this  problem,  as  well  as 
the  allied  problem  of  accounting  for  thought 
without  language,  no  longer  seems  as  formidable 
as  it  did  a  generation  ago.  The  doctrine  of  evo- 
lution carries  with  it  the  absolute  necessity  for 
the  evolution  of  speech  by  some  natural  process, 
and  the  exact  nature  of  that  process  is  a  matter 
of  detail  that  science  may  safely  be  trusted  to 
make  clear.  As  for  Miiller's  contention  that 
thought  is  impossible  without  language,  it  may 
be  said  that  Whitney's  acute  polemic  assailed  it 
with  considerable  success  a  generation  ago,  and 
that  the  natural  psychology  of  the  past  score  of 
years,  as  contrasted  with  the  artificial  psychology 
of  an  earlier  period,  has  made  it  evident  that 
thought  and  language  are  parallel  developments, 
to  neither  of  which  can  any  absolute  priority  be 


252  Editorial  Echoes 

assigned.  Perhaps  the  clearest  exposition  of  this 
scientific  view  is  that  made  by  Romanes  about 
fifteen  years  ago.  In  this,  as  in  many  other  mat- 
ters, Miiller's  intellect  never  quite  escaped  from 
the  metaphysical  stage  of  development,  a  fact 
w^hich  is  best  illustrated  by  his  thoroughgoing 
acceptance  of  the  Kantian  philosophy  as  the  final 
expression  of  metaphysical  thought.  *  That  last 
infirmity  of  the  philosophic  mind,'  as  the  ^  Kant- 
ian superstition '  is  styled  by  Professor  Shorey, 
stiffened  to  the  end  the  intellectual  processes  of 
the  brilliant  scholar  whose  death  we  now  deplore, 
and  impeded  their  free  and  natural  operation. 
There  is  no  reproach  in  this,  but  there  is  some 
occasion  for  regret  that  a  thinker  of  Miiller's 
capacity  should  have  been  kept  many  years  be- 
hind his  age  by  the  trammels  of  a  system  that 
had  long  since  accomplished  its  work. 


In  Memoriam  253 


WILLIAM  MORRIS. 

Of  the  six  great  poets  whose  names  stand  pre- 
eminent in  the  later  Victorian  era,  five  have 
gone  to  their  rest,  and  the  solitary  figure  of  Mr. 
Swinburne  alone  remains  to  bear  aloft  the  torch 
of  the  singer.  Rossetti  died  in  1882,  Arnold  in 
1888,  Browning  in  i88g,  Tennyson  in  1892; 
and  in  1896  'the  idle  singer  of  an  empty  day/ 
as  William  Morris  styled  himself  with  modesty 
no  less  excessive  than  that  which  prompted  Keats 
in  the  suggestion  of  his  own  epitaph,  ceased  from 
life,  and  entered  into  the  inheritance  of  fame  that 
he  shares  with  Chaucer  and  Boccaccio,  with  the 
creators  of  Norse  saga  and  mediaeval  French 
romance.  The  death  of  these  five  men  one 
after  another,  without  the  appearance  of  any 
new  poet  comparable  with  the  least  of  them,  has 
practically  established  the  contention  made  many 
years  ago  by  Mr.  Stedman,  that  a  well-marked 
period  in  English  poetry  was  drawing  to  its  close 
with  the  last  quarter  of  the  nineteenth  century. 


254  Editorial  Echoes 

The  affinities  of  Morris  are  with  Rossetti  and 
Mr.  Swinburne,  rather  than  with  Arnold,  Brown- 
ing, or  Tennyson  ;  and  the  public  early  learned 
to  associate  the  three  poets  first  named,  not  only 
with  one  another,  but  also  with  the  movement 
in  English  painting  of  which  Rossetti  was  one  of 
the  chief  glories.  These  men,  painters  and  poets 
alike,  have  been  variously  described  as  Pre- 
Raphaelites,  members  of  the  stained-glass  school, 
apostles  of  mediaevalism  and  of  Renaissance  art. 
No  one  of  the  epithets  is  exact  or  comprehensive, 
but  all  are  at  least  suggestive  of  the  aims  and 
methods  of  the  extraordinary  group  of  men  of 
genius  to  whom  they  are  applied.  And  of  the 
three  poets  concerned  it  is  to  be  noted  that 
Morris  was  the  first  to  make  himself  heard, 
'  The  Defence  of  Guenevere  '  was  published  in 
1858;  three  years  later  came  Rossetti's  'Early 
Italian  Poets,'  and  Mr.  Swinburne's  '  Rosamond' 
and  'The  Queen  Mother.'  It  was  not  until 
1870  that  Rossetti's  first  collection  of  original 
poems  was  exhumed  from  the  grave  of  his  wife 
and  given  to  the  world.  When  we  examine  the 
total  poetical  product  of  the  three  men,  we  find 
a  wide  differentiation  of  achievement,  although  a 


In  Memoriam  255 

common  impulse  and  common  sympathies  may 
be  detected  at  their  starting-points.  The  dra- 
matic genius,  the  political  and  ethical  passion, 
displayed  by  Mr.  Swinburne  in  his  maturer  work, 
are  without  a  parallel  in  the  work  of  Morris; 
nor  did  the  latter  long  remain  trammelled  by  the 
mysticism  and  the  spiritual  subtlety  that  were 
characteristic  of  Rossetti's  poetry  to  the  last.  As 
for  comparison  with  Arnold,  Browning,  and  Ten- 
nyson, it  is  clean  out  of  the  question.  These 
men  felt  the  whole  burden  of  the  modern  world, 
were  oppressed  by. its  enigmas,  and  looked  toward 
the  future  rather  than  the  past.  Morris,  on  the 
other  hand,  found  all  his  inspiration  in  the  past, 
and  the  golden  age  of  which  he  sang  was  envis- 
aged as  a  reversion  rather  than  as  a  progressive 
evolution.  '  Dreamer  of  dreams,  born  out  of  my 
due  time,'  he  called  himself;  and,  man  of  affairs 
that  he  became  and  remained  to  outward  seem- 
ing, his  inner  life  was  always  attuned  to  the 
simpler  harmonies  of  the  naive  older  world. 

The  plan  and  craftsmanship  of '  The  Earthly 
Paradise,'  the  work  by  which  Morris  is  best 
known,  are  such  as  to  make  inevitable  some 
comparison  with  'The  Canterbury  Tales,'  and 


256  Editorial  Echoes 

the  author  has  frequently  been  described  as  a 
modern  Chaucer.  The  ascription  of  this  title 
has  a  certain  rough  external  value,  but  little  more. 
Certainly  we  may  say  that  '  The  Earthly  Para- 
dise '  is  the  only  work  in  all  English  literature  to 
challenge  comparison  with  '  The  Canterbury 
Tales.'  Nearly  five  hundred  years  had  to  elapse 
after  the  death  of  Chaucer  before  England  could 
produce  his  peer  as  a  story-teller  by  right  divine. 
But  the  similarity  does  not  extend  far  beyond 
this  fact.  Chaucer's  tales  were  in  their  essence 
prophetic  rather  than  retrospective;  they  heralded 
the  coming  glories  of  English  literature,  they 
were  in  a  sense  the  precursors  of  the  Elizabethan 
drama  and  the  modern  novel.  The  tales  told  by 
Morris  have  in  common  with  them  little  except 
the  qualities  of  easy  rhythm  and  noble  diction 
that  belong  to  all  great  poetry,  and  the  fact  that 
they  are  tales  and  not  subjective  outpourings. 
Of  the  wit,  the  shrewdness,  the  practical  good 
sense,  the  dramatic  faculty,  and  the  insight  into 
the  recesses  of  individual  character  displayed  by 
ChauCer,  there  is  very  little  to  be  found  in 
Morris ;  but  we  find  instead  the  conception  of 
men  as  types  rather  than  individuals,  the  fresh 


In  Memoriam  257 

and  simple  outlook  upon  nature,  the  very  breath 
and  finer  spirit  of  all  romance.  We  find,  too, 
a  curious  blend  of  Hellenism  with  mediaevalism, 
or  rather  an  amalgam  of  the  elements  of  pure 
beauty  common  to  both  styles,  the  objectivity, 
the  simplicity,  and  the  grace  of  an  art  hardly 
tinged  with  self-consciousness  and  innocent  of 
any  concealed  ulterior  motive. 

Pure  beauty  may  indeed  be  taken  as  the  note 
of  all  the  poetry  that  William  Morris  has  left  for 
the  enrichment  of  our  literature.  *•  Full  of  soft 
music  and  familiar  olden  charm,'  to  use  Mr. 
Stedman's  felicitous  phrase,  it  has  the  power  to 
lull  the  senses  into  forgetfulness  of  this  modern 
workaday  world,  to  restore  the  soul  with  draughts 
from  the  wellsprings  of  life,  to  bring  back  the 
wonder  of  childhood,  the  glory  and  the  dream 
that  we  may  perhaps  have  thought  to  be  vanished 
beyond  recall.  It  is  poetry  to  read  in  the  long 
summer  days  when  we  seek  rest  from  strenuous 
endeavor  ;  it  is  poetry  for  the  beguilement  of  all 
weariness,  and  for  the  refreshment  of  our  faith 
in  the  simple  virtues  and  the  unsophisticated  Hfe; 
it  is  poetry  that  brings  a  wholesome  and  healing 
ministry  akin  to  that  of  Nature  herself  j  it  is 

17 


258  Editorial  Echoes 

poetry  that  leaves  the  recollection  unsullied  by 
any  suggestion  of  impurity  and  unhaunted  by  any 
spectre  of  doubt.  Like  Lethe,  it  has  the  gift  of 
oblivion  for  those  v^ho  seek  the  embrace  of  its 
waters ;  but,  unlike  the  dark-flowing  stream  of 
the  underworld,  its  surface  is  rippled  by  the 
breezes  of  earth,  its  banks  are  overarched  by 
living  foliage,  and  its  waves  mirror  the  glad  sun- 
light. This  rich  treasure  of  song  includes  the 
tentative  first  volume  of  miscellaneous  poems, 
the  great  epic  of  ^  The  Life  and  Death  of  Jason,' 
the  twenty-four  tales  of  the  wanderers  who 
sought,  but  did  not  find,  '  The  Earthly  Paradise,' 
the  ^  morality  '  of  '  Love  is  Enough,'  the  story  of 
'  Sigurd  the  Volsung,'  and  the  volume  of  *•  Poems 
by  the  Way.'  To  this  list  we  should  also  add 
the  versions  of  the  '  Odyssey '  and  the  ^  iEneid,' 
which  are  great  English  poems,  whatever  may 
be  said  of  them  as  translations. 

We  have  thus  far  made  no  mention  of  the 
group  of  works  in  which  the  genius  of  the  poet 
found  a  new  medium  of  expression  during  the 
last  few  years  of  his  life.  There  is  nothing  in 
English  literature  sufficiently  like  them  to  be  put 
in  the  same  class  with  the  series  of  seven  books 


In  Memoriam  259 

that  began  with  '  The  House  of  the  Wolfings ' 
and  ended  with  'The  Sundering  Flood/  post- 
humously published.  These  romances  mingle 
formal  poetry  with  a  sort  of  poetic  prose  that  has 
all  the  qualities  of  poetry  save  metre,  and  that 
does  not  err  —  this  is  a  very  important  point  — 
by  any  approach  to  rhythmical  regularity.  Mr. 
Watts-Dunton  says  the  final  word  upon  the 
subject : 

<  While  the  poet's  object  is  to  arouse  in  the  listener  an 
expectancy  of  caesuric  effects,  the  great  goal  before  the 
writer  of  poetic  prose  is  in  the  very  opposite  direction; 
it  is  to  make  use  of  the  concrete  figures  and  impassioned 
diction  that  are  the  poet's  vehicle,  but  at  the  same  time 
to  avoid  the  expectancy  of  metrical  bars.  The  moment 
that  the  regular  bars  assert  themselves  and  lead  the  read- 
er's ear  to  expect  other  bars  of  the  like  kind,  sincerity 
ends.* 

Of  poetic  prose  in  the  true  sense  are  these  ro- 
mances chiefly  made,  and  their  beauty  is  as  abso^ 
lute,  in  its  own  way,  as  the  beauty  of  the  avowed 
poems.  We  may  speak  of  these  books  as  a 
class  by  repeating  what  we  said  some  years  ago 
in  a  review  of  one  of  them  — '  The  Story  of  the 
Glittering  Plain.'  'The  reader  of  Mr.  Morris's 
first  volume  of  poems  might  have  discerned 
therein  glimpses  of  the  author's  affinities  for  an 


26o  Editorial  Echoes 

art  even  less  sophisticated  than  the  Chaucerian, 
and  of  the  ideals  of  a  still  more  primitive  age. 
The  subsequent  development  of  the  author's 
genius  has  made  this  clear  enough,  and  the  types 
of  thought  and  speech  which  he  has  delighted  to 
embody  have  grown  more  and  more  archaic  and 
remote.  He  has  found  the  true  springtime  of 
the  world,  not  even  in  the  poems  of  Homer,  but 
in  the  sagas  of  Iceland,  in  the  conditions  of  Teu- 
tonic life  of  which  Tacitus  affords  us  a  glimpse, 
and  in  the  still  more  primeval  regions  which 
myth  and  folk-lore  enable  us  to  penetrate.  And 
he  has  developed  a  style  in  keeping  with  the  life 
which  he  depicts,  a  style  which  has  p^ermitted 
him  to  translate  the  saga  literature  as  it  was  never 
translated  before,  a  style  of  severe  and  noble 
simplicity  from  which  the  Latin  element  of  the 
language  is  all  but  wholly  banished.' 

In  the  foregoing  characterization  of  Morris, 
he  has  been  considered  simply  as  an  English 
man  of  letters,  with  no  reference  to  the  many 
activities  that  he  associated  with  the  pursuit  of 
literature.  In  a  strict  sense,  of  course,  poetry 
was  his  avocation,  just  as  it  was  with  Oliver 
Wendell  Holmes ;  but  the  world  will  remember 


In  Memoriam  261 

the  poet  in  both  cases  long  after  it  has  forgotten 
the  professor  of  medicine  and  the  master  of  dec- 
orative design.  Yet  if  Morris  had  written  no 
books  he  would  have  been  one  of  the  most  note- 
worthy men  of  his  time,  and  his  labors  in  the 
field  of  the  practical  arts  would  have  earned  for 
him  the  warmest  gratitude  of  all  who  are  strug- 
gling to  make  the  world  better  worth  living  in. 
In  the  department  of  household  decoration  he 
did  much  to  develop  the  public  taste  for  books 
that  are  mechanically  works  of  art ;  as  the  advo- 
cate of  what  are  probably  impossible  ideals  of 
social  organization,  he  did  much  to  stimulate  the 
moral  sense  of  Englishmen,  and  persuade  them 
that  ours  is  by  no  means  the  best  of  all  possible 
civilizations.  He  lived  a  great  and  a  good  life, 
in  the  best  sense  a  life  of  service  to  mankind, 
and  his  death  was  a  loss  which  it  would  be  diffi- 
cult to  exaggerate. 


262  Editorial  Echoes 


WILLIAM    BLACK. 

The  popular  novelist  who  is  the  subject  of  this 
sketch  was  born  in  Glasgow,  in  1841,  and  had 
attained  the  age  of  fifty-seven  years  at  the  time 
of  his  death  in  1898.  His  education  was  some- 
what irregular,  and  he  never  went  through  the 
public  school  and  university  courses  which  pre- 
pare for  their  work  most  Englishmen  who  attain 
intellectual  distinction.  Instead,  he  was  taught 
in  private  institutions,  and,  his  early  leanings 
being  in  the  direction  of  art,  he  spent  two  years 
in  the  Government  Art  School  of  his  native  city. 
'  As  an  artist,'  he  says,  '  I  was  a  complete  fail- 
ure, and  so  qualified  myself  for  a  time  in  after 
life  as  art  critic'  But  it  must  be  remarked,  as  a 
corrective  to  his  own  humorous  self-depreciation, 
that  his  insight  into  the  artistic  temperament  is 
one  of  the  characteristic  features  of  his  literary 
work,  and  that,  if  success  in  landscape  painting 
upon  the  canvas  was  beyond  his  reach,  few 
writers   have   ever   been    so    successful    in    the 


In  Memoriam  263 

verbal  painting  of  landscape.  The  impression  of 
natural  beauty,  as  conveyed  by  hundreds  of  de- 
scriptive pages  scattered  through  his  novels,  is 
deep  and  lasting  ;  one  of  the  chief  causes  of  our 
indebtedness  to  him  is  his  joy  in  the  changeful 
moods  of  nature,  in  which  he  has  made  every 
one  of  his  readers  share. 

When  Black  made  the  discovery  that  he  could 
write  better 'than  he  could  paint,  he  found  in 
journalism  the  doorway  to  literature,  as  so  many 
others  have  done,  and  became  connected  with 
the  London  '  Morning  Star.'  This  was  in  1865, 
when  Mr.  Justin  McCarthy  was  the  editor  of 
that  journal.  He  served  the  '  Star '  as  special 
correspondent  at  the  time  of  the  war  between 
Prussia  and  Austria.  Soon  thereafter  he  became 
a  member  of  the  '  Daily  News '  editorial  staff, 
occupying  that  post  for  several  years,  and  writing 
leaders  upon  the  politics  and  questions  of  the 
day.  Meanwhile,  he  was  fledging  his  wings  as 
a  novelist;  and  in  1867  'Love  or  Marriage' 
was  published  in  the  conventional  three-volume 
form.  This  was  soon  followed  by  '  In  Silk 
Attire,'  and  this  by  '  Kilmeny,'  a  beautiful  and 
pathetic  story,  written  during  the  period  of  se- 


264  Editorial  Echoes 

elusion  that  followed  the  double  bereavement 
caused  by  the  death  of  his  wife  and  his  child. 
In  187 1  ^A  Daughter  of  Heth '  appeared,  and 
its  author  leaped  into  popularity  with  the  wider 
public  that  had  known  nothing  of  his  preceding 
books.  This  sudden  accession  of  fame  found 
abundant  warrant  in  the  work  to  which  it  was 
due,  for  '  A  Daughter  of  Heth '  was  not  only 
vastly  superior  to  anything  that  had  come  before 
it,  but  was  to  remain  the  highest  artistic  achieve- 
ment of  the  writer.  When  we  now  look  back 
to  it,  we  look  along  the  vista  of  more  than  a 
score  of  novels  that  have  followed  it,  and  we 
find  no  one  of  them  as  completely  satisfying, 
symmetrical,  and  artistic  in  the  finest  sense. 

The  story  of  Black's  life  during  the  seventies, 
eighties,  and  nineties,  is  the  story  of  his  books, 
and  nothing  more.  Even  his  trip  to  the  United 
States,  in  the  early  seventies,  calls  for  no  com- 
ment beyond  the  statement  that  it  inspired 
'  Green  Pastures  and  Picadilly,'  and  possibly  the 
further  observation  that  from  this  time  on  the 
novelist's  heroines  became  somewhat  alarmingly 
addicted  to  humor  of  the  American  rather  than 
the  English  type.    For  the  rest,  his  seasons,  like 


In  Memoriam  265 

those  of  his  heroes,  alternated  between  the 
drawing-rooms  and  clubs  of  London  and  the 
coasts  and  moors  of  the  Highlands  that  he  loved 
so  well.  The  one  serious  book  that  he  wrote 
was  the  life  of  Goldsmith  contributed  to  the 
'English  Men  of  Letters  '  series  in  1879.  The 
novels,  as  we  have  said,  number  upwards  of  a 
score,  for  hardly  a  year  passed  after  he  began  to 
write  them  that  has  not  added  one  or  two  to  the 
list. 

Among  all  these  fictions,  some  are  so  lament- 
ably weak  that  they  had  far  better  have  remained 
unwritten.  Probably  '  That  Beautiful  Wretch  ' 
represents  the  lowest  plane  upon  which  it  was 
possible  for  Black's  talent  to  work.  Many  others 
must  be  considered  pot-boilers  and  nothing  more. 
Still  others  are  the  merest  replicas,  as  to  motive, 
situations,  and  accessories,  of  his  early  successes, 
and  nothing  more  need  be  said  of  them.  But 
there  remains  a  residuum  of  work,  including  per- 
haps half  a  dozen  titles,  which  cannot  be  ignored 
in  any  survey  of  Victorian  literature,  and  upon 
which  the  author's  fame  will  ultimately  rest.  Of 
'  A  Daughter  of  Heth '  we  have  already  spoken, 
and  '  A  Princess  of  Thule  '  must  be  placed  on 


266  Editorial  Echoes 

nearly  the  same  level  in  a  comparative  estimate 
of  Black's  novels.  In  '  Judith  Shakespeare '  he 
acquitted  himself  of  a  peculiarly  delicate  task 
with  rare  tact  and  restraint.  Its  glimpses  of  the 
homely  life  of  that  spacious  age  in  which  the 
poet  lived,  and  of  the  poet  himself  in  his  char- 
acter as  a  prosperous  citizen  of  Stratford,  are 
altogether  charming,  and  display  unfailing  taste. 
When  '  Sunrise '  appeared,  many  among  the 
novelist's  following  rubbed  their  eyes  at  this 
strange  new  departure,  for  here  Black  deserted 
his  wonted  haunts  and  familiar  characters  to 
write  a  romance  on  the  European  revolutionary 
movement,  a  romance  filled  with  plottings  and 
dark  secrets,  a  romance  inspired  by  the  '  Songs 
before  Sunrise '  that,  a  few  years  previously,  had 
revealed  in  Mr.  Swinburne  so  great  a  lyrical  gift 
as  had  not  been  known  since  Shelley.  But '  Sun- 
rise '  was  only  a  '  sport '  among  the  author's 
writings,  and  he  at  once  reverted  to  his  earlier 
manner  and  his  well-worn  themes.  Among  the 
remaining  novels,  there  are  none  that  stand  out 
from  the  others  quite  as  distinctly  as  the  four 
that  we  have  named.  The  tragic  gloom  that 
enwraps  the  ending  of '  Macleod  of  Dare '  makes 


In  Memoriam  267 

the  reader  remember  it  rather  better  than  its  fel- 
lows, and  the  more  gracious  aspects  of  the  nov- 
elist's talent  are  perhaps  better  displayed  than 
elsewhere  in  such  books  as  '  White  Wings '  and 
^  White  Heather.'  But  we  will  make  no  more 
invidious  comparisons.  We  have  read  with  some 
gratitude  even  the  feeblest  of  these  novels,  and 
with  much  gratitude  the  best  of  them.  They 
have  provided  sweet  and  wholesome  entertain- 
ment for  many  an  idle  hour,  and  we  reflect  with 
genuine  sorrow  that  the  source  of  this  entertain- 
ment is  now  dried  up  forever. 

It  is  related  that  Carlyle  once  said  to  Black, 
in  the  course  of  a  conversation  :  '  Ay,  ay,  ye  ken 
our  Scotland  weel,  but  tell  me,  mon,  when  are 
ye  gaun  to  do  some  wark  ? '  Souls  of  the  stren- 
uous sort,  who  expect  novelists  to  deal  with  the 
serious  problems  of  society,  and  who  insist  upon 
the  ethical  motive,  if  not  upon  the  didactical 
method,  will  not  find  their  account  in  the  novels 
of  William  Black,  unless  they  think  of  him  solely 
as  the  author  of'  Sunrise.'  Such  souls  have  their 
Mr.  Meredith  and  their  Mr.  Hardy  and  their 
Mrs.  Humphry  Ward,  and  we  do  not  deny  them 
the  right  to  their  point  of  view.    But  when  they 


268  Editorial  Echoes 

go  out  of  the  way  to  institute  invidious  compari- 
sons between  the  novelists  they  happen  to  like 
and  such  accomplished  craftsmen  of  a  different 
sort  as  Mr.  Black  and  Mr.  Blackmore,  we  feel" 
bound  to  protest.  The  novelist  now  under  con- 
sideration did  not  have  the  genius  of  Mr.  George 
Meredith,  for  example,  but  he  cultivated  a  saner 
method,  and  the  talent  that  expresses  itself  by  the 
methods  of  sanity  is  not  unworthy  of  being 
ranked,  in  the  total  estimate,  upon  a  level  with 
the  genius  that  expresses  itself  by,  let  us  say, — 
that  we  may  avoid  the  harsher  term  so  obviously 
suggested,  —  the  methods  of  perversity.  Those 
intellectueh^  in  the  name  of  whatever  uncouth  or 
morbid  form  of  art  they  may  make  their  plea, 
are  not  to  be  allowed  the  final  word  when  it  comes 
to  an  appraisal  of  so  graceful  and  abundantly- 
endowed  a  writer  as  was  William  Black.  He 
is  likely  always  to  be  reckoned  as  one  of  the 
five  or  six  best  English  novelists  of  his  time  — 
that  is,  of  the  last  quarter  of  the  nineteenth 
century. 


In  Memoriam  269 


JOHN   FISKE. 

American  scholarship  suffered  a  serious  loss  in 
the  death  of  John  Fiske,  in  the  Summer  of  190 1, 
at  the  age  of  fifty-nine.  His  health  had  always 
been  so  robust,  and  his  vitality  was  so  seemingly 
inexhaustible,  that  the  news  of  his  sudden  taking- 
ofF  came  to  us  with  a  shock,  although  an  ob- 
server skilled  in  the  lore  of  physiology  might 
possibly  have  seen  in  the  very  massiveness  of 
that  frame,  with  its  extraordinary  capacities  for 
the  consumption  of  meat  and  drink,  as  well  as 
for  the  exercise  of  both  physical  and  intellectual 
activities,  the  sign  of  a  development  so  abnormal 
that  its  powers  of  resistance  must  be  weakened 
somewhere,  and  would  be  in  danger  of  giving 
way  to  some  unusual  strain.  The  strain  came 
with  the  torrid  heat  that  spread  like  a  blanket 
over  this  country  in  the  Summer  of  his  death, 
and  marked  among  its  thousands  of  victims  this 
distinguished  historian  and  philosopher. 

The  leading  facts  in  the  life  of  John  Fiske 


270  Editorial  Echoes 

may  be  stated  in  a  few  words.  He  was  born 
in  Connecticut  in  1842.  His  true  name  was 
Edmund  Fiske  Green,  which  he  chano-ed  in 
boyhood  to  that  of  a  grandfather  with  whom  he 
went  to  live,  thus  acquiring  the  name  by  which 
he  is  known  to  the  world.  He  was  a  child  of 
extraordinary  precocity,  at  the  age  of  ten  or 
twelve  mastering  subjects  that  are  usually  re- 
served for  the  later  stages  of  the  education  of 
young  men.  In  this  respect,  his  life  suggests 
that  of  Cotton  Mather  or  of  John  Stuart  Mill, 
and  the  stories  told  of  the  tender  years  of  those 
worthies  may  all  be  matched  in  the  records  of 
John  Fiske's  childhood.  He  went  through 
Harvard  College  mainly  as  a  matter  of  form, 
and  remained  in  that  institution  after  graduation 
as  instructor  and  as  an  assistant  in  the  library. 
When  about  thirty  years  of  age  he  became  a 
professional  scholar  and  man  of  letters  almost  to 
the  exclusion  of  any  other  occupation,  although 
he  continued  to  lecture,  at  intervals,  for  the  rest 
of  his  life.  During  these  years,  he  made  his 
home  in  Cambridge,  although  he  travelled  con- 
siderably, both  in  this  country  and  in  Europe. 
Such  are  the  modest  annals  of  this  life  of  devo- 


In  Memoriam  271 

tion  to  the  things  of  the  mind ;  what  remains  to 
be  said  of  the  man  who  lived  it  must  relate 
chiefly  to  his  ideas  and  the  books  in  which  they 
were  expressed. 

Philosophy  and  history  were  the  major  pre- 
occupations of  Mr.  Fiske  during  his  working 
years,  and  nearly  all  of  his  writings  belong  to  the 
one  or  the  other  of  these  subjects,  although  now 
and  then  a  book  may  be  said  to  do  hardly  more 
than  touch  the  fringes  of  either  history  or  phil- 
osophy. This  is  true,  for  example,  of  the  little 
book  called  '  Tobacco  and  Alcohol,'  a  spirited 
polemic  directed  against  James  Parton's  'Smoking 
and  Drinking,'  which  latter  work  was  a  most 
intemperate  exposition  of  the  ideas  commonly 
misassociated  with  the  name  of  temperance.  It 
is  also  true  of  the  volumes  that  are  made  up  of 
miscellaneous  matter,  for  many  of  the  essays  here 
included  represent  the  author's  diversions  rather 
than  his  serious  pursuits.  We  are  glad  that  he 
had  diversions,  for  we  owe  to  them  much  stimu- 
lating entertainment,  such,  for  instance,  as  is 
provided  by  that  brilliant  study,  published  within 
the  last  few  years,  of  the  Bacon-Shakespeare 
delusion  and  its  victims. 


272  Editorial  Echoes 

Of  Mr.  Fiske's  two  subjects,  philosophy  came 
first.  He  was  a  very  young  man  when  he  made 
a  visit  to  England,  became  acquainted  with  Dar- 
win, Huxley,  and  Mr.  Herbert  Spencer,  and 
returned  home,  his  brain  seething  with  the  new 
evolutionary  thought.  Of  this  thought  he  became 
the  leading  American  exponent,  and  his  '  Outlines 
of  Cosmic  Philosophy,'  published  in  1874,  was 
a  re-statement  of  the  Spencerian  system  that 
seemed  to  many  readers  an  improvement  upon 
the  original,  so  greatly  did  Mr.  Spencer's  ideas 
benefit  by  the  lucidity  and  literary  art  of  his 
American  disciple.  This  work  was  supplemented 
in  a  way,  some  years  later,  by  two  small  volumes 
entitled  '  The  Destiny  of  Man '  and  '  The  Idea 
'  of  God,'  and,  after  his  death,  by  '  Life  Ever- 
lasting,' a  third  volume  in  this  series.  These 
proved  to  be  the  most  widely  popular  of  Mr. 
Fiske's  writings,  but  his  best  friends,  and  those 
having  the  most  intimate  acquaintance  with  his 
thought,  looked  upon  them  as  not  altogether 
worthy  of  their  author.  In  their  attempt  to 
reconcile  the  teachings  of  science  with  religious 
dogma  these  books,  when  carefully  examined, 
seem  flavored  with  sophistry,  and  lend  a  sort  of 


In  Memoriam  273 

countenance  to  beliefs  that  are  fundamentally 
inconsistent  with  the  evolutionary  doctrine.  In 
a  word,  they  produce  the  impression  of  a  writer 
who  is  not  quite  honest  with  himself,  and  is 
willing  to  make  an  intellectual  compromise  with 
a  system  of  ideas  that  he  is,  as  it  were,  under 
bonds  to  oppose.  Eveji  Mr.  Spencer  felt  called 
upon  to  protest  against  some  of  the  religious 
implications  that  his  follower  sought  to  fasten 
upon  the  synthetic  philosophy. 

About  twenty  years  ago,  Mr.  Fiske  turned  his 
attention  from  philosophy  to  American  history, 
and  nearly  all  of  his  subsequent  work  was  done 
in  the  latter  field.  Political  philosophy  served 
him  as  a  bridge  for  this  transition,  and  his  book  on 
'  American  Political  Ideas '  marked  the  turning- 
point  in  his  career.  He  remained  to  the  end 
essentially  a  philosophical  historian  rather  than  a 
historian  of  manners,  or  even  of  wars,  and  the 
drum  and  trumpet  ideal  was  kept  as  far  as  pos- 
sible out  of  his  work.  A  masterly  treatment  of 
'The  Critical  Period  of  American  History'  was 
the  first  of  the  series  of  works  which,  although 
they  seemed  detached  studies  for  a  time,  were 
gradually  seen  to  take  their  places  in  what  was 

18 


274  Editorial  Echoes 

to  prove  a  systematic  survey  of  our  national  rec- 
ords. '  The  Beginnings  of  New  England '  and 
'  The  American  Revolution '  soon  followed,  and 
the  author's  design  assumed  solidity  and  continu- 
ity. Then  came  '  The  Discovery  of  America,' 
dealing  with  the  whole  period  of  exploration  and 
determination  of  the  coast-line  of  the  New 
World.  After  this,  the  order  of  production  be- 
came more  logical,  for  the  next  works  were 
'Virginia  and  Her  Neighbors'  and  'The  Dutch 
and  Quaker  Colonies.'  Here  the  record  ends, 
except  for  a  detached  study  of  a  part  of  the  Civil 
War  period,  and  a  number  of  admirable  books 
for  schools  and  young  people.  Taken  as  a  whole, 
Mr.  Fiske's  work  in  American  history  gives  us  a 
fairly  complete  treatment  of  the  subject  from  the 
time  of  the  discoverers  down  to  the  adoption  of 
the  Constitution,  excepting,  of  course,  the  one 
field  which  is  the  exclusive  province  of  Francis 
Parkman  It  is  brilliant  work,  fine  in  its  liter- 
ary quality,  and  remarkable  for  its  judicial  tone 
and  its  power  to  deal  with  conflicting  opinions, 
determining  upon  which  side  lies  the  weight 
of  the  evidence.  It  is  work  that  fairly  places 
the  author  among  our  great  historians,  in  the 


In  Memoriam  275 

group  that  includes  Prescott  and  Motley,  Ban- 
croft and  Parkman,  Mr.  Henry  Adams  and  Mr. 
James  Ford  Rhodes. 

The  chief  impression  that  is  left  upon  the 
mind  of  one  acquainted  with  Mr.  Fiske's  work 
in  its  entirety  is  that  of  a  thoroughly  sane  and 
well-balanced  intellect.  There  are  so  many  in- 
stances of  men  who  are  clear-headed  in  the  work 
that  engages  their  best  activities,  yet  who  betray 
weakness  in  some  other  direction,  that  it  is  re- 
freshing to  come  in  contact  with  a  mind  which 
seems  to  have  had  no  serious  intellectual  infirm- 
ity. The  best  of  men  are  subject  to  occasional 
vagaries,  and  one  could  make  up  a  long  list  of 
able  thinkers  who  have  ^  a  screw  loose  '  some- 
where, in  whose  mental  armor  there  is  some  weak 
point.  The  vulnerable  spot  may  be  reached  by 
spiritualism,  or  the  single  tax,  or  palmistry,  or 
telepathy,  or  the  delusions  of  '  Christian  science' 
and  the  Baconian  authorship  of  Shakespeare's 
plays.  From  such  vagaries  of  the  intellect  John 
Fiske  seems  to  have  been  absolutely  free.  His 
scientific  and  philosophical  training  was  so  com- 
prehensive, his  sense  of  the  value  of  evidence 
was  so  sure,  his  insight  into  all  the  methods  of 


276  Editorial  Echoes 

fraud  and  pretense  was  so  unerring,  that  no  form 
of  pseudo-science  could  get  a  lodgment  in  his 
brain.  He  seems  to  have  taken  the  right  view 
of  every  subject  to  which  he  gave  his  attention, 
the  view,  that  is,  which  is  supported  by  the  con- 
sensus of  intelligent  opinion  among  those  who 
speak  with  authority.  We  cannot  call  him  an 
original  thinker,  —  which  might  be  doubtful 
praise,  if  we  could,  —  but  we  can  say  of  him 
that  he  has  had  few  equals  in  penetrative  grasp 
and  understanding  of  the  more  serious  problems 
of  modern  science,  history,  and  philosophy. 


In  Memoriam  277 


HAROLD  FREDERIC. 

American  fiction  could  ill  afford  to  lose  so 
good  a  writer  as  Harold  Frederic,  who  died  at 
Henley,  England,  on  the  nineteenth  of  October, 
1898.  His  reputation  as  a  novelist  was  hardly 
more  than  ten  years  old,  but  it  was  firmly  fixed, 
and  we  had  come  to  think  of  him  as  one  of  our 
foremost  story-tellers,  as  one  to  the  growth  of 
whose  powers  there  was  no  readily  assignable 
limit.  That  he  should  have  been  taken  away  in 
the  very  prime  of  life  —  for  he  had  only  com- 
pleted his  forty-second  year — is  of  itself  a  happen- 
ing sufficiently  tragic,  and  the  tragedy  becomes 
heightened  by  the  circumstances  under  which  he 
died,  for  he  fell  into  the  hands  of  those  fanatics 
who  deny  the  efficacy  of  the  scientific  treatment 
of  disease,  and  was  refused  the  medical  attend- 
ance which  might,  it  is  claimed,  have  averted 
the  disaster  of  his  early  death.  A  heavy  indict- 
ment lies  against  those  who  were  responsible  for 
the  neglect,  and  they  stand  condemned  morally 


278  Editorial  Echoes 

even  if  they  are  beyond  the  reach  of  the  civil 
law. 

Harold  Frederic  v^^as  born  on  a  farm  in  cen- 
tral Nevi^  York,  August  19,  1856,  of  an  ancestry 
in  which  English,  French,  and  Dutch  elements 
were  commingled.  His  childhood  was  familiar 
with  poverty,  and  his  schooling  ended  with  his 
fourteenth  year.  Forced  thus  to  become  a  self- 
educated  man,  his  subsequent  career  gave  evi- 
dence once  more  of  the  truth  —  which  some  seek 
to  minimize  or  even  to  deny  —  that  education  is 
none  the  less  education  because  a  man  gets  it  by 
his  own  unaided  efforts,  and  that  the  education 
gained  in  this  strenuous  way  may  be  of  a  more 
solid  kind  than  that  attested  by  a  parchment  cer- 
tificate. After  a  few  years  of  employment,  first 
as  office-boy,  then  as  draughtsman,  then  as  re- 
toucher of  photographic  negatives,  Frederic  found 
himself  landed  in  journalism,  and  speedily  made 
his  way  to  the  front.  At  twenty-four,  he  was 
one  of  the  editors  of  the  Utica  'Observer';  at 
twenty-six,  he  became  editor  of  the  Albany 
'Evening  Journal';  at  twenty-eight,  he  was  en- 
gaged by  the  New  York  '  Times,'  and  sent  to 
London,  as  correspondent  for  that  newspaper. 


In  Memoriam  279 

After  1884,  then,  his  career  was  public  property, 
and  his  death  left  us  sadly  wondering  at  the  posi- 
tion he  created  for  himself  during  the  last  fourteen 
years  of  his  life,  and  at  the  amount  of  serious 
work  that  he  had  accomplished  before  the  end. 
It  was,  we  believe,  in  this  first  year  of  his 
English  life,  that  we  first  saw  the  name  of  Harold 
Frederic  in  print.  It  was  signed  to  a  short  paper 
in  the  '  Pall  Mall  Gazette,'  written  '  by  an  Amer- 
ican in  London,'  and  devoted  to  an  account  of 
the  condition  of  literary  affairs  in  the  United 
States.  We  well  remember  asking  ourselves 
who  this  man  could  be,  whose  name  was  wholly 
unfamiliar,  yet  who  wrote  with  so  much  assur- 
ance and  intelligent  grasp  of  his  subject.  It  was 
not  until  some  three  years  later  that  the  name 
again  attracted  our  attention,  when  it  was  attached 
to  a  striking  story  called  '  Seth's  Brother's  Wife,' 
which  began  to  appear  serially  in  one  of  the 
magazines.  From  this  time  on  —  which  amounts 
to  saying  for  ten  years  —  the  name  was  well 
known  to  all  American  readers,  and  came  to 
stand  for  good  literary  work  conscientiously  per- 
formed, in  whatever  field  of  activity  its  owner 
might  choose  to  engage. 


28o  Editorial  Echoes 

As  a  correspondent,  Mr.  Frederic's  work  was 
very  widely  known  during  the  later  years  of  his 
life.  His  London  letters,  printed  in  a  number 
of  our  leading  newspapers,  were  the  most  inter- 
esting of  their  kind,  full  of  energy  and  ideas, 
bringing  a  trained  mind  to  bear  upon  current 
questions  of  politics,  society,  and  art,  and  em- 
bodying as  much  of  style  as  could  reasonably  be 
expected  of  a  writer  who  used  the  Atlantic  cable 
for  his  instrument.  Moreover,  on  at  least  two 
notable  occasions,  Mr.  Frederic  was  not  content 
with  providing  for  his  American  public  the  news 
supplied  to  his  hand  in  London,  but  set  out  to 
obtain  news  of  his  own  by  direct  investigation. 
It  was  in  1884,  at  the  outset  of  his  career  as  a 
newspaper  correspondent,  that  he  made  a  per- 
sonal inspection  of  the  cholera-infected  districts 
of  Southern  France  and  Italy.  He  visited  Mar- 
seilles and  Toulon  in  the  days  when  the  popu- 
lation of  those  cities  was  panic-stricken,  and  his 
letters  upon  the  subject  were  an  important  con- 
tribution to  our  knowledge  of  the  epidemic  at  a 
time  when  it  was  feared  that  even  our  own 
country  was  threatened  with  invasion  by  the 
dreaded  plague.     The  second  of  the  occasions 


In  Memoriam  281 

referred  to  was  in  1891,  when  the  recrudescence 
of  Jew-baiting  in  Russia  was  made  the  subject 
of  a  personal  investigation  by  Mr.  Frederic,  the 
result  of  his  observations  being  published  the 
following  year  in  a  graphic  and  impressive  work 
entitled  '  The  New  Exodus  :  A  Study  of  Israel 
in  Russia.' 

This  work,  and  the  newspaper  correspondence 
which  he  carried  on  for  fourteen  years,  gave 
Mr.  Frederic  considerable  prominence  as  a  stu- 
dent of  public  affairs,  and  his  firm  grasp  of  political 
problems  made  him  something  of  an  authority 
upon  contemporary  history.  All  this  work,  how- 
ever, is  of  a  sort  soon  to  be  inevitably  forgotten, 
because  essentially  ephemeral.  But  Mr.  Fred- 
eric's fiction  is  not  ephemeral,  and  claims  for  him 
a  high  place  among  American  novelists.  Ten 
volumes  in  ten  years  is  not  a  bad  record,  when 
we  consider  that  their  author  was  by  vocation  a 
journalist,  and  a  man  of  letters  only  by  avocation, 
especially  when  we  consider  that  the  ten  volumes 
are  of  a  far  higher  character  than  the  work  of  most 
journalists,  that  they  are  reasonably  free  from 
those  touches  of  crudeness  and  vulgarity  that 
few  journalists  are  able  to  exclude  from  their 


282  Editorial  Echoes 

attempts  to  produce  literature  of  the  serious  sort. 
The  ten  volumes  are  these  :  '  Seth's  Brother's 
Wife'  (1887),  'The  Lawton  Girl'  (1890), 
'In  the  Valley'  (1890),  'The  Return  of  the 
O'Mahony'  (1892),  'The  Copperhead'  (1894), 
'Marsena,  and  Other  Stories  of  the  War'  (1895), 
'The  Damnation  of  Theron  Ware'  (1896), 
'March  Hares'  (1896),  'Gloria  Mundi,' and 
'  The  Market  Place,'  posthumously  published. 
Of  these  volumes  '  March  Hares '  and  '  The 
Return  of  the  O'Mahony  '  are  extravaganzas, 
and  stand  apart  from  the  rest.  Neither  of  them 
w^ould  we  w^illingly  miss,  for  they  display  a  richly 
humorous  side  of  the  author's  fancy,  the  existence 
of  w^hich  w^ould  hardly  be  suspected  by  readers 
of  his  other  novels.  The  second  of  the  two  just 
named,  in  particular,  has  never  enjoyed  half  the 
popularity  it  deserves ;  for  exuberant  vitality  it 
outranks  the  others,  although  this  character  is 
doubtless  gained  at  the  expense  of  more  artistic 
qualities.  From  the  other  eight  novels,  '  In  the 
Valley '  stands  apart  as  a  work  of  historical 
fiction,  in  the  sense  that  it  deals  with  a  bygone 
period.  We  make  this  distinction  because  all  of 
the  novels  are  historical  in  some  sense  of  the 


In  Memoriam  283 

term.  Of  '  In  the  Valley/  which  deals  with  the 
Revolutionary  period  of  our  history,  and  with 
the  events  that  prepared  the  way  for  an  American 
victory  at  Saratoga,  we  do  not  hesitate  to  say  that 
it  is  one  of  the  best  historical  novels  that  we 
have,  a  strong  and  vivid  portrayal  of  one  of  the 
most  stirring  and  pregnant  periods  in  our  national 
annals. 

Seven  books  remain  for  a  few  words  of  char- 
acterization. Five  of  them  deal  with  the  region 
and  the  period  that  the  author  knew  so  well,  the 
central  New  York  of  the  sixties,  seventies,  and 
eighties.  They  accomplish  for  that  region  and 
that  period  the  work  of  analysis  and  portraiture 
that  so  many  of  our  writers  are  doing  for  other 
regions  and  contemporary  periods.  Two  of  them 
reproduce  for  us  the  feeling  with  which  the  old 
North  viewed  the  Civil  War,  and  show  us  the 
cross-currents  of  sentiment  and  the  conflicting 
passions  that  divided  non-combatants  as  well  as 
combatants.  Two  others  are  more  strictly  do- 
mestic in  their  interest.  The  fifth,  by  common 
consent  Mr.  Frederic's  most  successful  novel, 
has  for  its  theme  the  warfare  waged  by  two  relig- 
ious ideals  in  the  battle-field  of  a  man's  soul ; 


284  Editorial  Echoes 

but  even  this  powerful  work  is  at  the  same  time 
a  richly  observant  study  of  provincial  American 
society.  The  two  posthumous  novels  deal  with 
English  life,  and  must  be  reckoned  less  valuable 
than  their  predecessors.  We  may  perhaps  be 
permitted  to  quote,  in  closing,  a  few  words  that 
we  wrote  of  the  best  of  these  novels  at  the  time 
of  its  appearance :  ^  Mr.  Frederic  has  aimed  to 
produce  a  great  and  typical  picture  of  American 
life,  and  an  unerring  instinct  has  taught  him  that 
such  a  picture  must  be  concerned  with  the  life 
of  a  small  community  rather  than  with  the  more 
attractive  but  also  more  sophisticated  civilization 
of  the  great  cities.  It  is  in  the  small  community 
that  the  mainsprings  of  a  nation's  strength  are  to 
be  felt  most  distinctly  and  the  elements  of  its 
weakness  most  clearly  discerned  ;  it  is  here  that 
its  fundamental  ideals  are  most  naively  offered  to 
the  view.'  These  words  were  written  of 'The 
Damnation  of  Theron  Ware,'  but  their  applica- 
tion extends  to  the  greater  number  of  Mr.  Fred- 
eric's novels,  and  for  this  reason  they  are  here 
reproduced. 


In  Memoriam  285 


RICHARD  MALCOLM  JOHNSTON. 

In  a  contribution  to  '  Literature,'  Mr.  W.  D. 
Howells  discusses  the  Southern  literary  product 
of  the  United  States,  saying  of  Mr.  Harris  and 
Mr.  Cable  that  they  are  'certainly  the  best 
known  '  of  our  recent  Southern  writers,  and  sup- 
posing '  there  can  be  no  question  but  they  are 
the  first.'  The  task  of  arranging  writers  accord- 
ing to  their  rank  is  always  invidious  and  usually 
unprofitable,  but  in  this  case  the  death  of  Colonel 
Richard  Malcolm  Johnston,  makes  it  necessary 
to  question  the  dicta  of  Mr.  Howells,  and  to 
assert  that  no  list,  however  narrowly  restricted, 
of  our  foremost  Southern  writers  can  be  accepted 
if  it  does  not  include  the  name  of  that  novelist, 
scholar,  and  gentleman.  The  omission  by  our 
eccentric  critic  of  Mr.  Johnston's  name  may, 
however,  be  attributed  to  a  strange  misconcep- 
tion. In  the  same  article,  Mr.  Howells  speaks 
of  'a  school  of  Southern  humorists  before  the 
war,'  and,  after  describing  their  work  as  '  atro- 


286  Editorial  Echoes 

cious,'  says  that  he  wishes  '  distinctly  to  except 
from  this  censure  the  "  Dukesborough  Tales " 
and  the  other  sketches  by  the  same  author,  which 
have  a  whimsical  grace  and  are  simple  and  often 
sweet,  with  a  satisfying  air  of  truth.'  We  infer 
from  this  that  Mr.  Johnston  is  reckoned  among 
the  ante-bellum  writers,  whereas  the  '  Dukesbo- 
rough Tales  '  made  their  first  collected  appearance 
in  1883,  and  their  author  had  done  nothing  2t 
all  in  the  way  of  literary  production  until  four  or 
five  years  previously,  when  the  publication  of  a 
few  tales  and  sketches  in  the  magazines  first 
directed  attention  to  his  name. 

Mr.  Johnston  is  given  a  unique  position  in  our 
literature  by  the  fact  that  he  was  nearly  sixty 
years  old  before  he  began  to  be  a  writer,  and 
that  back  of  his  literary  period  there  lies  nearly 
a  lifetime  of  activity  as  a  lawyer  and  a  professor 
of  literature.  He  was,  then,  an  ante-bellum  writer 
only  in  the  sense  that  his  fiction  dealt  almost  ex- 
clusively with  a  period  long  ante-dating  the  Civil 
War,  and  restored  for  a  new  generation  a  past 
that  had  vanished  from  the  memory  of  most  liv- 
ing men.  The  period  was  that  of  the  thirties 
and  forties,  and  the  place  Middle  Georgia,  a  time 


In  Memoriam  287 

and  a  region  of  which  the  '  form  and  pressure ' 
are  preserved  to  us  in  Mr.  Johnston's  books  with 
a  faithfulness  of  delineation  and  a  geniality  of 
conception  barely  equalled  and  certainly  unsur- 
passed by  the  best  of  the  younger  school  of 
Mocal'  writers  whose  work  forms  so  important 
a  part  of  recent  imaginative  literature  in  this 
country.' 

The  Middle  Georgia  of  the  novelist's  youth 
and  early  manhood  is  made  so  interesting  a  sub- 
ject for  our  contemplation  that  a  few  quotations 
from  him  in  his  character  as  historian  of  his  na- 
tive section  rather  than  as  story-teller,  may  fit- 
tingly be  reproduced  upon  this  occasion.  In  a 
paper  written  only  three  years  before  his  death, 
to  be  read  before  the  Twentieth  Century  Club 
of  Chicago,  Mr.  Johnston  said  : 

*  If  ever  there  was  a  man  who  felt  himself  to  be  abso- 
lutely a  freeman,  it  was  the  rustic  of  Middle  Georgia. 
.  .  .  The  poorest  white  man  had  no  apprehension  of 
falling  into  the  lower  scale,  and  so  his  ambitions  were 
the  freer  and  the  more  cheerful  to  lift  himself  higher. 
...  In  my  own  immediate  neighborhood,  some  seventy- 
five  miles  west,  not  one  grown  man  in  five  had  ever  been 
to  Augusta,  then  a  town  of  some  six  thousand.  .  .  . 
Sometimes  in  an  argument  between  two  rural  persons 
one,  who  might  be  on  the  verge  of  defeat,  if  by  some 


288  Editorial  Echoes 

sort  of  chance,  not  enjoyed  by  his  adversary,  he  had  been 
to  Augusta,  might  look  upon  him  with  such  contempt  as 
was  possible  to  feel,  and  say:  <«Now  look  here,  John, 
has  you  ever  been  to  Auglisty  ?  "  On  the  sad  acknowl- 
edgement in  the  negative,  he  might  add:  <*Well,  then, 
don't  try  to  talk  to  me  about  sech  matters,  because  they 
is  matters  as  can't  be  complete  understood  except  by 
them  as  has  been  to  Augusty."  .  .  .  To  one  who 
remembers  the  conditions  and  incidents  of  such  a  society 
it  seems  difficult  to  overpraise  its  neighborliness,  tlie 
healthfulness,  the  confidence,  the  warm  affectionateness 
which — except  among  mean  people,  and  mean  people 
are  in  every  community  —  generally  obtained.  None 
were  very  rich  and  none  very  poor,  but  rich  and  poor, 
especially  among  men,  intermingled  with  the  freedom  of 
intercourse  that  was  productive  of  results  most  beneficial 
to  all.  .  .  .  Aristotle  taught  that  leaders  in  societies 
should  think  like  wise  men,  but  talk  like  the  common 
people.  That  was  just  what  was  done  by  leading  citizens 
of  Georgia  three-quarters  of  a  century  ago.  .  .  .  The 
noble  Georgia  dialect  savored  in  much  affectionate  sweet- 
ness. Much  of  it,  as  I  have  been  told  hi  letters  from 
eminent  philologists,  is  a  relic  of  English  as  spoken  three 
and  four  centuries  ago.  .  .  .  The  greatest  lawyers  and 
politicians  and  even  divines  loved  it  to  the  degree  that 
they  habitually  spoke  it,  if  not  at  home  before  their  wives 
and  children,  at  least  in  social  intercourse  among  their 
neighbors.' 

Such  was  the  almost  idyllic  social  life,  and 
such  the  dialect,  of  the  people  who  live  for  us 
in   Mr.  Johnston's  fiction.*     No  phase  of  local 


In  Memoriam  289 

American  society  has  received  more  faithful  and 
loving  depiction  anywhere  in  our  literature,  and 
the  peculiar  value  of  Mr.  Johnston's  stories  is  in 
their  application  to  a  comparatively  early  period 
of  the  realistic  methods  of  recent  literary  art. 
The  older  writers  neglected  their  opportunity,  or 
did  not  know  how  to  make  effective  use  of  it, 
but  the  facts  were  recorded  upon  the  sensitive 
plate  of  Mr.  Johnston's  memory  and  given  fresh 
vitality  in  the  alembic  of  his  genius.  There  is 
dialect  in  profusion  in  his  books,  but  it  gives  no 
offence,  for  we  easily  distinguish  it  from  the 
spurious  effusions  of  dialect  that  have  made  their 
eruption  in  our  fiction  of  recent  years.  It  is  the 
genuine  thing,  the  inevitable  garment  of  the 
thought  which  it  clothes ;  it  is  not  adventitious, 
written  for  a  wanton  satisfaction  in  the  misspell- 
ing of  words.  It  is,  moreover,  carefully  studied 
and  conscientiously  reproduced,  combining  the 
scholar's  instinct  for  exact  truth  with  the  artist's 
instinct  for  effective  expression. 

The  following  list  includes  the  more  important 
of  Mr.  Johnston's  works  of  fiction  :  '  Dukes- 
borough  Tales,'  '  Old  Mark  Langston,'  ^  Two 
Gray    Tourists,'    '  Mr.   Absalom     Billingslea,' 

19 


290  Editorial  Echoes 

'  Ogeechee  Cross-Firings/  '  Widow  Guthrie/ 
'  Old  Times  in  Middle  Georgia,'  '  The  Primes 
and  Their  Neighbors/  *  Mr.  Billy  Downs  and 
His  Likes,'  and  '  Pearce  Amerson's  Will.'  Of 
these  works,  ^  Widow  Guthrie '  is  the  longest 
and  the  most  serious,  but  the  peculiar  gifts  of  the 
author  appear  to  better  advantage  when  he  works 
within  narrower  limits,  and  one  is  apt  to  recall 
most  vividly  some  of  the  ^  Dukesborough  Tales' 
or  some  of  the  sketches  contained  in  '  Old  Times 
in  Middle  Georgia.'  In  addition  to  his  fiction, 
he  published  a  life  of  Alexander  H.  Stevens  (in 
collaboration  with  Mr.  W.  H.  Browne),  and  two 
volumes  of  *•  Studies,  Literary  and  Social.'  The 
latter  volumes  are  excellent  reading,  and  deserve 
a  high  rank  among  books  of  essays,  although  it 
takes  some  effort  so  to  readjust  the  mental  focus 
as  to  think  of  the  author's  discoursing  seriously 
upon  such  subjects  as  '  Belisarius,'  or  '  American 
Philosophy,'  or  '  The  Minnesinger  and  Meister- 
singer,'  or  '  Shakespeare's  Tragic  Lovers.' 

Richard  Malcolm  Johnston  was  born  in  1822, 
on  a  plantation  in  Middle  Georgia.  When  a  boy 
he  removed  with  his  family  to  Powellton  (the 
Dukesborough    of  the    tales).      He   studied    at 


In  Memoriam  291 

Mercer  University,  Macon,  and  fitted  for  the 
bar.  A  law  partnership  with  Linton  Stephens, 
a  younger  brother  of  Alexander  H.  Stephens, 
lasted  for  about  ten  years,  when  he  became  a 
professor  in  the  University  of  Georgia,  at  Athens. 
From  this  time  on,  his  occupations  were  teach- 
ing, lecturing,  and  writing.  In  middle  life  he  be- 
came a  member  of  the  Roman  Catholic  Church. 
Married  at  an  early  age,  his  domestic  life  was 
singularly  happy,  and  the  death,  a  little  over  a 
year  before  his  own,  of  the  woman  who  had 
been  the  devoted  partner  of  his  joys  and  sorrows 
for  over  Rfty  years  left  him  —  to  take  his  own 
pathetic  words  from  a  letter  to  a  friend  — '  poor 
indeed  and  lowly  prostrate.'  But  he  added : 
'  Yet  I  feel  no  diminution  of  willingness  to  do 
the  work  of  the  remainder  of  my  time,  and  hope 
for  continuance  of  the  strength  necessary  for  it.' 
A  year  after  these  words  were  written  he  lay 
dying  in  the  hospital  at  Baltimore,  the  city  with 
which  he  had  been  identified  during  the  latter 
period  of  his  life.  When,  in  September,  1898, 
he  breathed  his  last,  he  bequeathed  to  American 
literature  a  body  of  work  that  will  not  soon  be 
forgotten,  and  to  those  who  enjoyed  the  privilege 


292  Editorial  Echoes 

of  his  friendship  the  memory  of  a  fine  spirit, 
gentle  in  the  truest  sense  of  the  term,  the  soul  of 
cordiality,  courtliness,  and  chivalry.  He  was 
dear  to  all  who  knew  him,  and  will  be  remem- 
bered as  we  remember  only  those  for  whom  our 
affection  is  the  deepest. 


In  Memoriam  293 


ALPHONSE   DAUDET. 

French  literature  could  ill  afford  to  spare  the 
graceful  pen  of  Alphonse  Daudet.  Within  five 
years  it  lost  in  Renan  its  greatest  prosateur  in  the 
domain  of  scholarship,  in  Taine  its  greatest  phil- 
osophical historian,  in  Leconte  de  Lisle  its  greatest 
poet,  and  in  Alphonse  Daudet  its  greatest  nov- 
elist. This  does  not  mean  that  Daudet  vi^as  a 
great  novelist  in  the  sense  of  Hugo  or  Balzac, 
or  even  of  Stendhal  or  Flaubert,  but  simply  that 
among  the  writers  of  fiction  left  living  during  the 
last  fifteen  years  of  the  century  he  was  clearly 
the  most  important,  and  that  we  may  scan  the 
horizon  of  dawning  reputations  in  vain  for  indi- 
cations of  any  other  likely  to  occupy  as  large  a 
place  in  the  literature  of  the  Republic.  His  suc- 
cess was  hardly  and  honorably  won,  and  his 
career  was  that  of  a  typical  man  of  letters.  The 
story  of  his  obscure  origin,  of  his  early  struggles 
for  a  livelihood,  of  his  eventual  recognition,  of 
his  constantly  growing  reputation  and  the  golden 


294  Editorial  Echoes 

sunset  of  his  assured  fame,  is  of  the  old  sort  so 
familiar  to  the  student  of  literary  history,  although 
one  not  often  to  be  read  in  books  as  charming 
as  those  in  which  Daudet  has  himself  told  it  — 
in  '  Le  Petit  Chose,'  to  begin  with,  and  later  in 
^  Trente  Ans  de  Paris,'  and  the  '  Souvenirs  d'un 
Homme  de  Lettres.' 

Daudet  was  a  Provencal  by  birth,  and  saw 
the  light  at  Nimes  in  1840.  His  boyhood  was 
spent  in  his  native  city  and  in  Lyons.  He  then 
obtained  a  position  as  usher  in  a  country  school, 
but  a  year  of  this  drudgery  was  all  that  he  could 
bear,  and  at  the  age  of  seventeen  he  started  to 
seek  his  fortune  in  Paris.  From  this  time  until 
the  War  of  1870,  he  struggled  to  gain  a  foot- 
hold in  the  world  of  letters,  receiving  support  for 
a  time  from  a  clerical  position  in  the  civil  ser- 
vice, and  finding  hapginess  in  marriage  with  the 
talented  woman  who  ever  after  remained  his 
devoted  companion  and  counsellor.  His  first 
book  was  '  Les  Amoureuses,'  a  volume  of  love 
poems.  Other  collections  of  verse  followed,  and 
quickly  won  for  the  young  writer  a  reputation. 
He  also  essayed  the  drama,  producing  nine  plays 
in  all,  besides  the   later   dramatizations   of  his 


In  Memoriam  295 

novels.  His  plays  had  no  great  success,  and  their 
titles  convey  little  to  the  average  theatre-goer  or 
reader  of  dramatic  literature. 

These  tentative  efforts  in  the  lyric  and  dra- 
matic provinces  of  literature  v^ere  supplemented 
by  journalistic  v^ork  done  for  '  Le  Figaro '  and 
other  papers,  and  in  this  vi^ork  we  find  the 
sketches  and  short  stories  in  which  Daudet's  true 
artistic  self  was  first  revealed.  '  Le  Petit  Chose,' 
that  exquisite  fragment  of  autobiography,  dates 
from  1868,  and  before  the  annee  terrible  he  had 
also  produced  the  charming  '  Lettres  de  Mon 
Moulin.'  When  the  war  was  over,  his  position 
as  the  greatest  master  of  the  short  story  was  still 
further  strengthened  by  the  '  Contes  du  Lundi,' 
the  '  Contes  et  Recits,'  and  other  collections. 
The  best  of  these  pieces  are  the  purest  gems  of 
their  sort  in  modern  French  literature.  Equal  in 
perfection  of  form  to  the  stories  of  Maupassant, 
they  have  a  substance  which  the  stories  of  the 
later  master  rarely  exhibit,  and  the  pathos  of  such 
studies  as  '  La  Derniere  Classe '  and  '  Le  Siege 
de  Berlin '  is  well-nigh  flawless.  He  is  indeed  to 
be  pitied  who  can  read  with  dry  eyes  these  mas- 
terpieces in  miniature.     The  short  stories  gave 


296  Editorial  Echoes 

to  their  author  just  the  sort  of  training  in  the 
niceties  of  literary  art  that  was  needed  to  develop 
his  powers  as  a  full-grown  novelist,  and  enable 
him  to  produce,  during  the  following  quarter- 
century,  the  series  of  fiction  that  gave  him  an 
unrivalled  position  among  the  French  novelists 
of  his  time.  Other  works  were  written  in  this 
later  period,  but  they  are  of  minor  importance  — 
rechauffes  or  chips  from  a  literary  workshop — and 
reveal  no  development  of  power  beyond  what 
was  displayed  when  Daudet  the  novelist  was  yet 
artistically  unborn. 

The  first  of  Daudet's  books  written  de  longue 
haleine  was  the  famous  '  Tartarin  de  Tarascon,' 
dated  1872.  In  this  book  and  its  two  succes- 
sors, '  Tartarin  sur  les  Alpes  '  (1886),  and  '  Port- 
Tarascon '  (1890),  he  achieved  his  greatest  title 
to  literary  fame,  for  these  three  works  projected 
into  literature  one  of  its  i^ssr  immortal  types  of 
character.  The  creation  of  Tartarin  stands  only 
just  below  such  figures  as  FalstafF  and  Sancho 
Panza.  The  intensely  human  figure  of  Daudet's 
hon-hunter,  mountain-climber,  and  colonial  ad- 
venturer is  a  fascinating  study  in  all  three  phases 
of  his  self-gloriou5  career ;  all  the  color  of  the 


In  Memoriam  297 

midi  glows  from  the  pages  in  which  his  exploits 
are  set  forth,  and  all  the  humorous  or  lovable 
foibles  of  the  Provencal  are  delineated  with  a 
touch  that  is  incisive  without  being  painful,  with 
a  geniality  that  robs  satire  of  its  sting,  and  finds 
in  happy  and  wholesome  laughter  a  universal  sol- 
vent for  the  most  varied  sentiments  and  emotions. 
Whatever  else  may  be  forgotten,  the  story  of 
Tartarin  will  be  remembered,  and  will  remain 
among  the  classics  of  nineteenth  century  litera- 
ture. 

The  greater  part  of  Daudet's  career  as  a  nov- 
elist was,  however,  devoted  to  the  production  of 
studies  of  modern  life  which  have  made  him  the 
chief  interpreter  of  the  second  imperial  and  third 
republican  periods  of  French  society.  They  do 
not,  it  is  true,  present  us  a  delineation  compar- 
able for  minute  observation  and  comprehensive- 
ness with  the  record  of  the  restoration  period 
that  is  made  in  the  forty  volumes  of  the  '  Co- 
medie  Humaine,'  for  not  every  age  can  produce 
a  Balzac,  but  they  do  provide  us  with  a  series  of 
careful  studies  wherein  much  of  recent  French 
life  is  pictured,  and  which  have  a  charm  of  style 
that  was  beyond  the  reach  of  Daudet's   great 


298  Editorial  Echoes 

predecessor.  Two  or  three  of  these  books  are 
comparatively  insignificant,  but  at  least  eight  of 
them  are  masterpieces  in  a  very  genuine  sense. 
They  are,  in  the  order  of  their  publication, 
^  Fromont  Jeune  et  Risler  Aine '  (1874), '  Jack ' 
(1876),  ^Le  Nabab'  (1878),  ^  Rois  en  Exil ' 
(1879),  'Numa  Roumestan'  (1880),  'L'Evan- 
geliste'  (1883),  'Sapho'  (1884),  and  '  L'lm- 
mortel '  (i888).  These  books  are,  on  the  whole, 
the  most  remarkable  collection  of  novels  pro- 
duced by  any  Frenchman  under  the  Third  Re- 
public. 

Space  fails  us  in  which  to  characterize  in  any 
detail  this  series  of  drames  parisiens.  They  are 
all  well-known  to  English  readers,  for  they  have 
been  promptly  translated  as  they  have  appeared. 
The  first  of  them  (called  *-  Sidonie'  in  the  English 
version)  was,  we  remember,  made  the  subject  of 
considerable  cheap  moralizing  when  it  appeared 
in  our  language,  with  the  natural  consequence 
that  it  became  widely  known.  Much  water  has 
flowed  under  the  bridges  since  then,  and  so 
many  writers  using  the  English  language  have 
bettered  whatever  instruction  in  immorality  was 
to  be  derived  from  the  literature  of  France  that . 


In  Memoriam  299 

'  Sidonie '  would  now  be  considered  very  mildly 
offensive  even  by  the  self-constituted  professional 
guardians  of  our  literary  virtue.  Daudet  has 
sometimes  been  called  the  French  Dickens,  an 
ascription  which  is  merely  absurd  if  based  upon 
any  comparison  between  the  humor,  say,  of  the 
'  Tartarin  '  books  and  of  '  Pickwick,'  but  which 
has  some  slight  justification  if  referred  to  the 
pathos  of  '  Jack,'  that  poignant  narrative  whose 
chief  fault  is  its  excessive  length.  Daudet's 
third  novel,  ^  Le  Nabab,'  is  probably  his  master- 
piece, although  this  claim  may  perhaps  be  con- 
tested by  the  partisans  of  '  Numa  Roumestan ' 
or  of  ^  Sapho.'  The  book  is  a  brilliant  picture 
of  Parisian  life  under  the  Second  Empire,  and  it 
portrays  the  corruption  of  that  period  with  an 
unsparing  brush,  although  the  figure  of  Mora  is 
delineated  with  a  more  kindly,  hand  than  actual 
history  warrants  —  a  fact  easily  explained  when 
we  remember  that  he  is  no  other  than  the  Due 
de  Morny,  whom  the  novelist  served  as  a  secre- 
tary for  a  number  of  years.  This  figure  and 
that  of  Numa  Roumestan  (who  is  Gambetta 
somewhat  more  disguised)  are  the  most  con- 
spicuous illustrations  of  the  novelist's   habit  of 


300  Editorial  Echoes 

introducing  prominent  public  characters  into  his 
fictions.  The  '  Rois  en  Exil '  is  a  gallery  of 
such  figures,  and  if  the  ^  Astier-Rehu  '  of '  L'lm- 
mortel'  is  not  any  particular  academician,  there 
are  not  a  few  who  might  have  found  themselves 
more  or  less  caricatured  in  him.  Something 
ought  to  be  said  about  '  Sapho,'  yet  a  few  words 
would  be  less  adequate  than  none  at  all.  The 
inscription  '  pour  mes  fils  quand  ils  auront  vingt 
ans  '  indicates  that  the  work  is  not  milk  for  babes 
or  food  for  bread-and-butter  misses,  and  shows 
also  how  large  a  question  any  discussion  of  such 
a  book  must  raise.  From  the  technical  stand- 
point of  literary  art  '  Sapho '  is  as  nearly  perfect 
as  anything  that  the  author  ever  wrote. 

The  literary  characteristics  of  Daudet  are 
admirably  outlined  by  Professor  B.  W.  Wells, 
upon  whose  '  Modern  French  Literature '  we 
have  relied  for  many  of  the  dates  and  other  mat- 
ters of  fact  given  in  the  present  sketch.  We  are 
told  that  '  to  the  naturalistic  temper  he  brought 
the  mind  of  an  idyllic  poet,'  that  rather  than 
^  architectural  power '  he  had  '  the  style  of  an 
impressionist  painter.'  The  resulting  product 
*  attains  the  highest  effects  of  art  without  arti- 


In  Memoriam  301 

ficiality,  and  is  at  once  classical  and  modern.' 
These  formulae  serve  fairly  well  to  express  the 
essence  of  Alphonse  Daudet's  work  and  to  record 
the  residual  impression  left  by  many  years  of 
acquaintance  with  his  varied  books  of  fiction. 


302  Editorial  Echoes 


VICTOR   CHERBULIEZ. 

There  are  readers  not  a  few  to  whom  the  death 
of  Victor  Cherbuliez  proved  a  loss  altogether  out 
of  proportion  to  his  importance  as  a  figure  in 
French  literature.  '  I  could  have  better  spared 
a  better  man '  was  the  feeling,  if  not  the  utter- 
ance, of  the  many  thousands  to  whom  the  long 
series  of  his  novels  had  been  an  unfailing  source 
of  entertainment  and  delight.  The  appearance 
of  a  new  book  by  this  talented  writer  never 
brought  with  it  the  thrill  of  a  prospective  sensa- 
tion, and  never  led,  as  far  as  we  are  aware,  to 
any  excited  public  discussion,  ranging  its  friends 
and  its  enemies  in  two  opposing  camps.  But 
the  promise  of  each  new  novel  (after  the  first 
few  had  given  evidence  of  the  writer's  quality) 
aroused  in  the  novelist's  ever-widening  audience 
a  sense  of  quiet  anticipatory  satisfaction  that  was, 
perhaps,  as  fine  a  tribute  to  his  merit  as  the  loud 
outcries  which  heralded  the  books  of  the  more 
conspicuous  among  his  contemporaries. 


In  Memoriam  303 

No  less  than  twenty-two  novels  came  from 
the  pen  of  this  industrious  writer  during  the 
thirty-five  years  of  his  literary  activity.  Most  of 
them  made  their  first  appearance  in  *-  La  Revue 
des  Deux  Mondes/  for  which  periodical  Cher- 
buliez  became  as  much  of  a  stand-by  as  George 
Sand  had  been  during  the  preceding  quarter- 
century  or  more.  The  list  of  the  novels  is  as 
follows :  '  Le  Comte  Kostia,'  '  Prosper  Ran- 
doce,'  '  Paule  Mere,'  '  Le  Roman  d'une  Hon- 
nete  Femme,' '  Le  Grand-CEuvre,'  '  L'Aventure 
de  Ladislas  Bolski,'  '  La  Revanche  de  Joseph 
Noirel/  '  Meta  Holdenis/  '  Miss  Rovel/  '  Le 
Fiance  de  Mile.  Saint-Maur,'  '  Samuel  Brohl  et 
Cie.,'  '  L'Idee  de  Jean  Teterol,'  '  Amours  Fra- 
giles,'  '  Noirs  et  Rouges,'  '  La  Ferme  du  Cho- 
quard,'  '  Olivier  Maugant,'  '  La  Bete,'  '  La 
Vocation  du  Comte  Ghislain,'  ^  Une  Gageure,' 
'  Le  Secret  du  Precepteur,'  '  Apres  Fortune 
Faite,'  and  ^  Jacquine  Vanesse.'  A  number  of 
these  novels  have  been  translated  into  English, 
but  the  majority,  we  should  say,  have  not  thus 
been  made  accessible  to  those  who  do  not  read 
the  original.  And,  in  our  opinion,  an  enter- 
prising publisher  in  England  or  the  United  States 


304  Editorial  Echoes 

would  find  his  account  in  a  complete  uniform 
edition  of  this  series  of  books. 

In  attempting  to  characterize  the  work  of 
Cherbuliez,  it  will  be  best  to  begin  with  a  few 
negative  statements.  We  have  already  said  that 
his  novels  are  not  sensational ;  this  statement 
may  be  amplified  by  noting  that  they  offer  no 
devotion  to  the  goddess  of  lubricity,  that  they 
are  neither  erotic  nor  neurotic,  and  that  they 
are  concerned  with  problems  only  as  the  novelist 
finds  problems  useful  for  the  illustration  of  char- 
acter. Their  delineative  power  is,  moreover,  not 
remarkable ;  it  betrays  the  hand  of  the  master- 
craftsman  rather  than  that  of  the  creative  artist, 
and  the  entire  gallery  of  figures  includes  few  that 
remain  living  in  the  memory.  When  we  com- 
pare the  most  studied  of  the  types  offered  us  by 
Cherbuliez  with  even  the  minor  types  of  the 
^  Comedie  Humaine,'  this  distinction  becomes  so 
obvious  that  it  needs  no  argument.  It  may  also 
be  said  that  the  novels  of  Cherbuliez  have  little 
or  no  atmosphere ;  they  have  instead  a  great  deal 
of  careful  local  coloring,  and  over  them  all  is 
shed  the  dry  light  of  the  philosophical  intelli- 
gence. 


In  Memoriam  305 

Essaying  now  a  more  positive  sort  of  criticism, 
we  must  emphasize  once  more  the  unfailing  in- 
terest of  these  books.  The  characters  are  gal- 
vanized into  just  enough  of  vitality  to  produce  a 
fairly  complete  illusion  when  they  are  before  us. 
They  are,  furthermore,  arranged  in  extremely 
interesting  relations  with  one  another,  and  the 
ingenuity  of  the  author  in  devising  new  situations 
is  really  extraordinary.  An  additional  element 
of  freshness  is  provided  by  the  great  variety  of 
scenes  to  which  we  are  introduced,  and  by  the 
extent  to  which  characters  of  other  nationalities 
than  the  author's  own  are  made  to  figure.  The 
descriptive  powers  of  the  novelist  are  admirable, 
and  we  '  skip  '  in  reading  him  at  the  peril  of  miss- 
ing something  delightful  or  important.  In  fact, 
his  readers  soon  learn  that  they  cannot  afford  to 
^  skip '  him,  for  his  books  have  almost  no  pad- 
ding, and  are  finished  in  the  minutest  details. 
Economy  of  material,  united  with  crispness  in 
expression  and  deftness  in  the  lesser  touches  of 
his  brush,  form  a  combination  of  qualities  that  go 
far  toward  explaining  his  charm.  That  he  is 
both  a  man  of  the  world  and  a  scholar  trained  in 

the  processes  of  exact  thought  are  two  further 

20 


3o6  Editorial  Echoes 

facts  that  are  frequently  borne  in  upon  the  read- 
er's mind  ;  the  former  by  the  ease  of  the  author's 
manner  when  dealing  with  many  diverse  condi- 
tions of  society,  the  latter  by  the  minute  and 
accurate  knowledge  of  a  great  range  of  subjects, 
displayed  by  him  without  ostentation  as  the  par- 
ticular occasion  demands,  and  in  the  aggregate 
too  extensive  and  solid  to  be  accounted  for  by 
any  theory  of  cramming  or  '  reading  up '  for  the 
special  purpose  at  hand.  When  we  add  to  all 
that  has  been  said  the  fact  that  a  gentle  irony 
pervades  his  work,  tempering  its  good  sense  and 
general  sanity  just  enough  to  keep  it  from  being 
dull  and  prosaic,  we  have,  in  a  measure  at  least, 
accounted  for  the  feeling  with  which,  having 
read  every  one  of  the  twenty-two  novels,  and 
expecting  to  read  all  of  them  again  in  default  of 
fresh  ones,  we  heard  of  the  death  of  Victor 
Cherbuliez. 

There  is  little  to  be  learned  from  a  chrono- 
logical study  of  this  man's  books.  He  was  one 
of  those  writers  who  early  make  their  mark,  and 
never  alter  it  very  much  after  it  is  once  made. 
His  first  books  and  his  last  display  about  the 
same   characteristics,  and  his  qualities,  together 


In  Memoriam  307 

with  their  attendant  defects,  appear  about  as  dis- 
tinctly in  the  '  Comte  Kostia '  of  1863  as  in  the 
'  Jacquine  Vanesse  '  of  1898.  His  best  books 
are  scattered  among  the  others,  and  bear  dates 
widely  separated.  We  might  name  among  them 
'Le  Roman  d'une  Honnete  Femme,'  '  Meta 
Holdenis,'  and  ^  Le  Secret  du  Precepteur,'  but  it 
seems  invidious  to  single  out  even  two  or  three, 
because  the  others  are  nearly  as  good.  Still, 
those  just  named  may  be  recommended  to  readers 
desirous  of  making  the  acquaintance  of  Cher- 
buliez ;  the  taste  once  acquired  may  be  trusted 
not  to  content  itself  with  so  little. 

It  should  be  remembered,  also,  that  Cherbu- 
liez  did  a  great  deal  of  writing  that  was  not  in 
the  form  of  fiction.  Indeed,  his  debut  as  a  man 
of  letters  marked  him  out  for  a  critic  of  art  and 
a  student  of  antiquity  rather  than  for  a  novelist. 
This  book  was  entitled  '  Un  Cheval  de  Phidias,' 
further  described  as  a  series  of  Causeries  Athen- 
iennes.'  A  later  volume  of  what  was  essentially 
art  criticism  was  called  '  L'Art  et  la  Nature.' 
Cherbuliez  was  also  a  publicist  and  critic  of  con- 
temporary society  and  politics,  in  this  capacity 
writing    regularly    for    '  La    Revue    des     Deux 


3o8  Editorial  Echoes 

Mondes,'  under  the  pseudonym  of  '  G.  Valbert,' 
for  a  long  term  of  years.  His  miscellaneous 
papers  upon  these  subjects  were  collected  into  a 
series  of  volumes  bearing  such  titles  as  '  Profils 
Etrangers,'  'L'Espagne  Politique,'  'L'Allemagne 
Politique,'  '  Hommes  et  Choses  d'Allemagne,' 
and  '  Hommes  et  Choses  du  Temps  Present.' 
Finally,  we  mention  the  fact  that  two  of  his 
novels,  '  Samuel  Brohl '  and  '  Ladislas  Bolski,' 
were  dramatized  by  him,  and  won  a  certain 
success  upon  the  boards. 

Charles  Victor  Cherbuliez  (to  give  him  for 
once  his  unfamiliar  full  name)  was  born  in  Gen- 
eva, July  19,  1829.  His  death  early  in  July, 
1899,  thus-  found  him  within  a  few  days  of  the 
completion  of  his  seventieth  year.  He  was 
descended  from  a  Protestant  family  that  had 
found  refuge  in  Switzerland  after  the  revocation 
of  the  Edict  of  Nantes,  and  in  1880  reclaimed 
his  French  citizenship  under  the  provisions  of 
the  law  provided  for  that  purpose.  His  educa- 
tion was  cosmopolitan,  begun  in  Geneva,  and 
continued  in  Paris,  Bonn,  and  Berlin.  In  1881 
he  became  one  of  the  Forty,  and  in  1892,  an 
officer  of  the  Legion  of  Honor.     Long  after  his 


In  Memoriam  309 

resumption  of  French  citizenship  he  continued 
to  live  in  Geneva,  where  he  occupied  a  chair  in 
the  University.  These  are  the  chief  facts  of  his 
externally  uneventful  career;  his  real  life  is 
revealed  to  us  in  the  many  volumes  of  his  pub- 
lished writings. 


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General  Libraty 

University  of  California 

Berkeley 


